Health Care Mandate: End Run Around a Two-thirds Tax Vote?
Gov. Gavin Newsom wants to create health care subsidies by pushing a mandate requiring those who don’t carry health care insurance to pay a fee. Or is it a tax? The distinction matters because Newsom is trying to accomplish his goal of expanding health care with majority vote bills. A tax requires a two-thirds vote […]
Union should face UC’s fiscal realities, work for sensible reforms
California high-school seniors soon will receive their diplomas full of hope and eager to learn more in college. Which is why the last thing they need is a tuition increase. Yet that’s just what could happen for those about to attend the University of California if the school meets the demands of unions threating to […]
Gov. Newsom’s Reverse Robin Hood Ploy
This week California Governor Gavin Newsom is taking a statewide tour to promote his plans to expand Obamacare, including coverage to undocumented adults. To pay for the expansion, Gov. Newsom wants to reinstate the individual mandate penalty – penalizing Californians who don’t buy insurance they cannot afford. This is the wrong approach. When the Affordable […]
The Perils of Regulating Drugs by Sound Bite
There is a legal adage that “hard cases make bad law.” California may soon rediscover this wisdom. Assembly member Jim Wood has introduced a bill (AB 824) with the intention of discouraging “pay-for-delay” tactics. “Pay-for-delay” practices refer to a situation when a manufacturer of a patented drug pays the manufacturer of a generic drug to […]
AB767: Why Insurance Should and Must Cover Infertility Treatment
Former First Lady Laura Bush wrote in her book Spoken From the Heart, “For those who deeply want children and are denied them, those missing babies hover like silent ephemeral shadows over their lives.” For six years, those tiny shadows haunted me.