Private Health Insurance Exchanges––Will They Save Money? Will the Idea Grow?

Private health insurance exchanges will save employers money but not make health insurance cheaper.

Because private health insurance will save employers money, they will grow.

Will Private Insurance Exchanges Reduce Health Insurance Costs?

There's lots of buzz these days about private insurance exchanges. The idea is to give employees more choice in purchasing their own individual coverage

Read more »

"Consumer-Driven Health Care: Promise and Performance"

I am always struck by the difference between the salesmanship of health plans offering consumer-driven health products and the reality of the data.James Robinson and Paul Ginsburg have an article in the January 27th edition of Health Affairs with an objective review of the consumer-driven movement of recent years.Here is the central point of the article:The performance of consumer-driven health

Read more »

Is the Bush Administration in Favor of Provider Transparency and Accountability or Aren't They?

Brian Klepper has shared an open letter he and Michael Millenson have written to HHS Secretary Leavitt regarding the issue of provider information transparency and the Department of HHS's apparent contradiction with its own policies.An Open Response To HHS Secretary Michael Leavittby Brian Klepper and Michael MillensonA few months ago, the two of us – both long-time advocates for transparency and

Read more »

Why Consumers’ Checkbook v CMS is a Sideshow--Bush Administration Refuses to Release Provider Data

Brian Klepper joins us again today with another one of his welcome posts. This time he points out the hypocrisy in CMS, which has been calling for market transparency, refusing to provide provider data to a consumer group.Why Consumers’ Checkbook v CMS is a Sideshowby Brian KlepperThere are people who call for market solutions as the answer to every societal problem, but who then work to restrict

Read more »

New Study Shows Lower Costs in Consumer-Driven Plans--But the Findings Won't Settle the Debate Over Just How Effective C-D Plans Are

HealthPartners, a highly regarded not-for-profit Minnesota health plan, has issued an important report on its consumer-driven care book of business. It includes Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) and Health Reimbursement Accounts (HRAs).Their findings include:After adjusting for "illness burden," HealthPartners found that heath care costs were 4.4% lower for members in a consumer-driven plan compared

Read more »

An Important and Disciplined Review of the Health Care Marketplace--The Latest Site Visit Report From 12 Markets

Good health care market intelligence is hard to come by. Information tends to come in the form of detailed and narrow, often backward looking, surveys that give us little texture for what key players are thinking. Or, at the other extreme, market information is often based on a relatively few almost random anecdotal impressions by "experts" as they do their work in the market.The highly respected

Read more »