The economist discusses retirement and healthcare — and his challenge transferring a retirement-savings account.
By Mark A. Stein
Aging Boomers Will Need Lots Of Care. We're Not Ready.
The Big Take
Bloomberg
By 2030, people over the age of 65 in the US will outnumber those under 18. That’s in part because people are living longer—a testament to modern medicine. But are our health systems and social programs equipped to support so many seniors at the same time?
Bloomberg reporter Priya Anand brings us the details on a tech startup that’s trying to fill part of the void in senior care—and the challenges it’s facing. And health economist Jonathan Skinner talks about how the US can actually meet the needs of aging Baby Boomers.
Read more: Assault Allegations Plague a $1.4 Billion Home Eldercare Startup
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Understanding the Red State Death Trip
New York Times Opinion
By Paul Krugman-Opinion Columnist
Last Friday the Medicare trustees released their latest report on the system’s finances, and it contained some unexpected good news:Expenditures are running below projections, and the Hospital Insurance Trust Fund won’t be exhausted as soon as previously predicted.
But one important reason for this financial improvement was grisly: Covid killed a substantial number of Medicare beneficiaries. And thevictims were disproportionately seniors already suffering from severe — and expensive — health problems. “As a result, the survivingpopulation had spending that was lower than average.”
Do you live in one of the highest-priced areas for health care?
Policygenius
By Myles Ma
The U.S. spent an all-time high of $4.1 trillion on health care in 2020, representing almost 20% of the gross domestic product. [1] Unlike other countries, the question of who pays that expense is spread out among different government and private funders who each follow different rules, leading to vastly divergent costs. To make things more confusing, the cost of health care varies even more based on where you live.
Skinner Honored for Lifetime Achievement in Health Economics
July 09, 2021 by Bill Platt
The Fuchs award cited the economics professor's work to improve health care systems.
Jon than Skinner research professor of economics and a professor at the Geisel School of Medicine, has received the Victor Fuchs Award for Lifetime Contributions to the Field of Health Economics from the American Society of Health Economists (ASHE).
"This is the highest honor one can achieve in the health economics field," says Nina Pavcnik, the Niehaus Family Professor in International Studies.
The real death toll from the pandemic in America may already be 300,000
Deaths from all causes — not just Covid-19 — are up since the pandemic started, a CDC report found.
By Julia Belluz@juliaoftoronto Oct 21, 2020, 10:10am EDT
The official Covid-19 mortality figures might be dramatically underestimating the real deathtoll of the pandemic in the US, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
From late January to early October, nearly 300,000 “excess deaths” occurred in America, the report authors estimate. That’s about a third more than the 216,025 coronavirus deaths the US reported in the same period.
Where Have All the Hospital Patients Gone?
Weathered, wiry and in his early 60s, the man stumbled into clinic, trailing cigarette smoke and clutching his chest. Over the previousweek, he had had fleeting episodes of chest pressure but stayed away from the hospital.
“I didn’t want to get the coronavirus,” he gasped as the nurses unbuttoned his shirt to get an EKG. Only when his pain had becomerelentless did he feel he had no choice but to come in.
In pre-pandemic times, patients like him were routine at my Boston-area hospital; we saw them almost every day. But for much of thespring and summer, the halls and parking lots were eerily empty. I wondered if people were staying home and getting sicker, and Iimagined that in a few months’ time these patients, once they became too ill to manage on their own, might flood the emergency rooms,wards and I.C.U.s, in a non-Covid wave.
Coronavirus Is Spreading Fast in Areas of U.S. That May Reopen Soon: Study
Déjà vu all over again: Health-care spending back on the rise
As we approach the 10-year anniversary of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Democratic presidential candidates are sparring over what to do in its second decade. Should we build on the ACA? Or scrap it, relying instead on private markets or “Medicare for All”? As the debate heats up, it’s worth reflecting on what the ACA has accomplished so far — and what it hasn’t.
Misconceptions About Health Costs When You’re Older
That does not mean that all the care provided to dying patients — or to any patient — is valuable. Another study finds that high end-of-life spending in a region is closely related to the proportion of doctors in that region who use treatments not supported by evidence — in other words, waste.
“People at high risk of dying certainly require more health care,” said Jonathan Skinner, an author of the study and a professor of economics at Dartmouth. “But why should some regions be hospitalizing otherwise similar high-risk patients at much higher rates than other regions?”