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Magazine
Nudging Medicaid | Charging beneficiaries can work—but only if the copays are well-designed

By Merrill Goozner | September 07, 2013 | Print Magazine

Should people newly eligible for Medicaid be treated differently from people getting coverage on the exchanges or, for that matter, from those who get coverage through their employers?
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Magazine
Medicaid expansion's tax implications | Opponents should consider fairest way to pay for healthcare

By Merrill Goozner | August 31, 2013 | Print Magazine

This Labor Day, let us reflect on the trials of the millions of our fellow Americans who struggle to make ends meet in part-time and near-minimum wage jobs that do not provide health insurance.
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Magazine
Letting the sunshine in | CMS rolls out tools to make physician payments program work

By Shantanu Agrawal | August 31, 2013 | Print Magazine

Financial relationships between the healthcare industry and the clinical community are a prevalent aspect of the healthcare landscape. A common financial interaction, for example, is when a physician receives a fee for consulting with a pharmaceutical...
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Magazine
The IPAB punching bag | New Mass. cost-control panel could provide ammunition for its defenders

By Merrill Goozner | August 24, 2013 | Print Magazine

Amid all the anger aimed at the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, no aspect of that wide-ranging statute has drawn more ire than the Independent Payment Advisory Board.
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Magazine
Readmissions penalties at work | Effort pushed most hospitals to reduce or eliminate penalties in second year

By Merrill Goozner | August 17, 2013 | Print Magazine

There was plenty of good news in the second-year results from the CMS' 30-day hospital readmissions penalty program, which was largely overlooked by the press.
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Magazine
The healthcare spending slowdown | Don't underestimate the role of government in enforcing change

By Merrill Goozner | August 10, 2013 | Print Magazine

Taken together, the ACA delivery system reforms have significantly shifted the national discussion among healthcare leaders. They are now universally focused on improving quality while lowering costs.
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Magazine
Fix is needed for subsidies | Reducing the minimal amount of coverage may be best way to tweak ACA

By Donald Susswein | August 03, 2013 | Print Magazine

Four key reforms to expand insurance coverage were intended to fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle; in reality, they fit like pieces from four different jigsaw puzzles.
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Magazine
The hard sell | Coverage expansion backers must parry political opposition

By Merrill Goozner | July 27, 2013 | Print Magazine

Nearly a decade ago, the first-year growing pains of the Medicare drug benefit drew a heated yet largely supportive political response.
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Magazine
Postponing the reckoning | Employer-based coverage is falling—a fact overlooked in latest controversy

By Merrill Goozner | July 13, 2013 | Print Magazine

The Obama administration's one-year delay in the employer mandate continues to generate confused and contradictory responses that ignore the collapse of the employer-based insurance system.
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