Medicaid
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The Rise in Health Insurance Prices: How Policy Can Change American Healthcare
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Experts have been warning the public about the impending increase in health insurance prices in 2025, with even sharper increases expected this year in 2026. This anticipated increase comes with a shrinkage in coverage and a strain on low-income Americans who will not be able to afford these hiking premiums.…
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Asynchronous Telepsychiatry: An Unused Solution to the Psychiatrist Shortage
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The United States is facing a severe shortage of psychiatrists. In 2018, 77% of counties in the United States reported a severe deficit of psychiatrists, while an estimated 60% of adults with mental illness were not able to receive treatment. This lack of services is even more glaring in rural…
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New Evidence on Insurance and Health Behavior
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Public health officials have long sought to improve health outcomes by influencing bad behaviors, like smoking or lack of exercise. Such behaviors are very clearly detrimental to health, so much so that it seems like no one would perform them—but people inevitably still do. Health policymakers are interested in improving…
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A Major Tear in the Chicago Safety-Net System
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Since 2000, the Chicago area has witnessed 20 hospital closures, a loss of nearly a quarter of the city’s hospitals. In the past three years alone, there were four scheduled hospital closures in the South and West sides, though one—Mercy Hospital—was saved at the last minute by an out-of-state investor.…
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Reducing Cost of Behavioral Health Services is Not Enough
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Approximately one in twenty adults in the US suffer from a serious mental illness (SMI) such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or major depressive disorder. Yet barriers to accessing behavioral health services, including mental health care and substance use treatment, remain high. The National Survey on Drug Use and Health revealed…
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Understanding the Impact of Medicaid on Poverty
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Medicaid continues to constitute a key component of the safety net for low-income households, covering more than 76 million Americans in 2016. Under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), 37 states expanded Medicaid to cover adults with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty line. Previously, adults were required to…
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Making Good Government Happen: A Conversation with Tom Komaniecki, Regional Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
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The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) is an independent division of HHS charged with protecting the integrity of HHS programs and the health and welfare of HHS program beneficiaries. The OIG is a nonpartisan “watchdog” that conducts audits, investigates fraud, and evaluates…
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Next Steps in Health Reform: An Interview with Kathleen Sebelius
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Kathleen Sebelius served as U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services from 2009 to 2014, where she was instrumental in the rollout of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Prior to her service in the federal government, she served as Governor of Kansas from 2003 to 2009. We asked Secretary Sebelius…
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Do People Move to Gain Medicaid Benefits?
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The welfare migration hypothesis proposes the idea that people will move to a location because of the availability of social welfare programs. Frequently studied in international development, it is equally applicable to internal migration in the United States due to the wide variation in social welfare programs across states. This variation…
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Expanded Medicaid Eligibility Reduces Debt for Low-Income Individuals
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In 2009, when President Obama placed healthcare at the top of his agenda, the weight of healthcare costs on individuals was a driving media narrative. Stories about families losing their homes to pay for cancer treatments added a human face to the fact that medical expenses are one of the…
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Taking a Closer Look at Elderly Medicaid Recipients
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Understanding how elderly individuals ultimately rely on Medicaid could be key to implementing changes that protect the fiscal longevity of both Medicaid and Medicare.