Archive | February, 2012

TEEN DRIVING’s A HARD BARGAIN — HERE’s HELP: Insuring a Young Driver is Expensive, but Insurance Companies Offer Discounts That Can Take the Sting Out of the Premium Bill.

Nov. 1–The safest way to keep teens safe is to keep them off the streets and highways. Adding a teen driver to a family’s auto insurance policy can easily double and triple the annual cost. Auto insu…

Star Tribune, Minneapolis, John Ewoldt Column: More on Rental Car Insurance? You Got It

Nov. 1–Readers sent in lots of questions and comments about last week’s column (www.startribune.com/65840922.html) on refusing insurance at the car rental counter. I wrote that anyone with Minnesota …

New Report Highlights How Health Insurance Reform Will Reduce Costs For Small Businesses

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius released a new report, Lower Premiums, Stronger Businesses: How Health Insurance Reform Will Bring Down Costs for Small Businesses. The report outlines the many ways health insurance reform will lower health care costs for small businesses and is available now at http://www.HealthReform.gov.

House Speaker Pelosi’s Health Reform Bill Sets The Gold Standard For Health Reform This Year

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi today unveiled her health reform bill that will be debated on the floor of the House of Representatives next month. The following is the statement of Ron Pollack, Executive Director of Families USA, about this development: “The House health insurance reform bill sets the gold standard for legislation that deserves to be adopted this year. “The bill will provide America’s families with peace of mind.

Today’s Opinions And Editorials

A Practical Reform: Indian Country As The 51st State Kaiser Health News The federal government could treat Indian Country, at least for health programs, as the 51st state. This seems to me a practical application of the nation-to-nation relationship (Mark Trahant, 10/29).

China’s Health Care System Is Also In Disarray

The Washington Post reports: “China’s health-care system is in disarray, a side effect of the market reforms that have spurred private enterprise and rapid growth since 1980. Before then, state-owned companies offered cradle-to-grave care, part of a system based on danwei, or work units, that provided health, education, pensions and other benefits.

Current, Former Mass. Governors Agree: Feds Should Do More Than Their States’ Model To Address Costs

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, a Democrat, and former Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican, both say that federal health reform plans should do more to address rising costs than their state’s initiative. “Unlike the Massachusetts plan, which focused first on getting residents to sign up for insurance and only now is turning to cost containment, federal legislation must include measures to trim medical costs if it wants to garner and keep public support, Patrick said,”

Health Bills Limit Out-Of-Pocket Costs, But There’s A Catch In The Fine Print

Health care bills pending in Congress could limit the out-of-pocket costs for consumers, but some of the fine print may cause sticker shock. “Consumers would be spared having to pay huge medical bills under Democratic health care legislation that’s moving through Congress, as lawmakers agree on the need to put limits on how much people would pay out of their own pockets,” McClatchy reports.

Health Bills Present Formidable Challenges To Number Crunchers

The House Democratic leadership is expected to unveil its health-overhaul legislation Thursday, the Associated Press reports. The next step will be for the merged bill – consolidated from three separate committee reports – to go to the Congressional Budget Office for a cost estimate, before lawmakers vote.

Senators Who Support The Public Option Hope Resistant Moderates Will ‘Come Around’

“Democratic Senators in favor of including a public insurance option in health care reform expect resistant moderates … to come around once they see the details of the final legislation,” Roll Call reports. Centrists such as Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., have suggested that they may not support reform with a public option. “Senate Democratic Conference Vice Chairman Charles Schumer (N.Y.