Posts Tagged With ‘ health care ’

Photo: White House The Inflation Reduction Act, signed into law a year ago, has many benefits for American consumers. It began making big corporations pay their fair share in taxes while investing more in items that help the middle class such as creating good-paying jobs, combating corporate price gouging, slashing the deficit, lowering prescription drug costs, and reducing carbon pollution. But while these efforts are helping everyday Americans, a new review from government watchdog Accountable.US shows several industries have never stopped trying to obstruct and weaken the Inflation Reduction... Continue Reading

I love the beautiful summer days here in the Seattle area. People are streaming into Western Washington due to the mild weather, attractive as climate change worsens, and the job opportunities. It’s so nice to be enjoying 70 degree weather as many areas of the country swelter. I’m also appreciating my wonderful garden with its abundant Swiss chard and kale. And my raspberry patch is yielding its usual pints of raspberries to freeze.   My blogger friends also are enjoying summer and other happenings: The value of staycations Let’s face it, we only get so many summers in our lives. And there’s... Continue Reading

The approval of a new drug to treat Alzheimer’s disease is controversial. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration gave full approval to the drug lecanemab (Leqembi) Thursday to treat adults with Alzheimer’s disease. In January, Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy organization, urged the agency not to approve the drug. In a letter to the FDA, it said that lecanemab investigators have concluded that longer trials are needed to determine the effectiveness and safety of lecanemab in early Alzheimer’s disease, and that three deaths thought to be related to the drug have now occurred in lecanemab... Continue Reading

Either I missed the Public Citizen report on the toll private equity is taking on U.S. health care or I didn’t understand the significance of it. The report, released in March 2023, says private equity takeovers have come with shocking lapses in safety, with prices rising faster than at non-private equity acquired entities, while patients have been subjected to price gouging schemes. Private equity acquisitions in the health care sector have climbed since the financial crisis in 2009, particularly in the past five years. Unlike acquisitions of hospitals, which usually occur under with public... Continue Reading

It’s not surprising what last year’s top consumer complaint was. I’ve seen it many times as No. 1 on annual consumer complaint lists. It’s auto sales and repair. “Consumers rely on cars to get to work, school, doctors’ appointments and more,” said Erin Witte, director of consumer protection for the Consumer Federation of America. Complaints related to the sale and leasing of new and used automobiles – pricing, advertisements, and mechanical defects – as well as issues related to the repair of vehicles. It’s the seventh year in a row that auto sales, leases, and repairs are... Continue Reading

No. What ended on Thursday was the covid health emergency on public health and safety measures in the United States. In addition, the World Health Organization recently ended the covid related global health emergency. The U.S. ended the covid health emergency because Republicans would no longer support funding for it. What does the end of the public health emergency mean for you? The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention offers this list of changes: Vaccines will remain available. Access to covid-19 vaccines will generally not be affected for now. The U.S. government is currently distributing... Continue Reading

I missed writing about Medicare Advantage plans during open enrollment from Oct. 15 to Dec. 7 when you can join, switch, or drop a plan. I always know when it occurs: my mail box and email are flooded with ads and TV and social media, too. I also get phone calls about the plans. The TV ads this year featured two African American women getting really excited about zero premiums. This is a deception, as I’ll get to later. There also was a guy sitting at a table at my local Safeway. Apparently, he had a deal with the Safeway corporate office to sell Medicare Advantage plans inside the store. I... Continue Reading

New Medicare enrollees can expect their uncertain medical expenses to take roughly $67,000 out of the household budget, on average, over the rest of their lives. Since this estimate is only an average, some retirees will pay less and some will pay much more. And the estimate, revealed in a new brief by Karolos Arapakis at the Center for Retirement Research and based on a larger study, includes only the copayments and cost-sharing charges paid by retired households over 65. It excludes their single largest medical expense – monthly insurance premiums. The estimate is, nevertheless, a useful benchmark... Continue Reading

This year, retirees were jolted by the 14.5 percent hike in Medicare’s Part B premium for medical services. It was the second-largest percentage increase in at least 20 years. The monthly premium, which rose to $170, will drop to $165 in 2023. But medical care is an expensive proposition that consumes a big chunk of many retirees’ income from Social Security, 401(k)s, and other sources. According to a new analysis of 2018 health care data, typical retirees had 88 percent of their total income left to buy everything else after paying for medical care. And one in 10 retirees with inordinately... Continue Reading

Left to their own devices, Americans who lack a retirement savings plan at work do not usually take the initiative to set up an IRA and save on their own. Oregon lawmakers decided to do something about that, and a new study finds that their approach of requiring employers without a plan to automatically enroll their workers in a state-sponsored IRA is reaching the right people. Nationwide, lower-income workers are much less likely to have a retirement plan, and the typical employee enrolled in the program, OregonSaves, earns only $22,600. They also tend to work in high-turnover industries like... Continue Reading