economy

The national recession didn’t just hit people living in the U.S. – it’s made it more difficult for people to pay for medical bills in poor countries like Honduras, new University of Michigan Health System research shows. Read More »

The Trans Pacific Partnership is the largest proposed trade deal in history impacting everything from how we use the internet to prescription drug prices. Public interest groups don’t have access to the negotiations, which involve 11 countries plus the U.S., but corporate lobbyists do. Given the potential for change, should the public have a say? Read More »

Federal funding cuts, and the insidious damage caused just since March by federal budget sequestration, have forced nearly one in five U.S. scientists to consider moving overseas to continue their research. Read More »

Technology is the primary cause of our skyrocketing health-care costs. It could also be the cure. Read More »

Recently, I resorted to a rare economic argument in a health IT article, pointing out that it’s unfair to put the burden of high health care costs on the patients. Now 101 economists have come out publicly recommending that very injustice. Their analysis shows the deep reluctance of those who are supposed to guide our health care policy to admit how distorted the current system is, and how entrenched are the powerful forces that keep it from reforming...But in this case, the average patient has knowledge that these economists lack. The problems are also well known to anyone in the health care industry who has the courage and clarity of vision to acknowledge what’s going on. If we want the system to change, let’s put public pressure on the people who are actually responsible for the problems–not the hapless patient.

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Now that the Obama administration has intervened in a patent infringement ruling between Apple and Samsung, uncertainty lingers over how effective the courts have been over such disputes. Is the patience of politicians beginning to wear thin? Read More »