This paper presents an overview of recent U.S. fiscal developments and discusses possible implications of the sharp turn around in the government’s fiscal position. Against this back ground, it also reviews key policy challenges that will need to be addressed to cope with the mounting...

This paper updates existing measures of the U.S. fiscal gap to include federal laws up to and including the mid-December 2010 federal fiscal stimulus. It then applies the methodology of generational accounting to establish how the burden of adjustment required to attain fiscal sustainability is...

Although the high percentage of the uninsured is an important public policy issue, discrepancies in both state and national estimates of the numbers of uninsured are reported. There is a critical need to address the methodological problem of the estimation. This study compares four advanced...

With rising healthcare expenditure and limited budgets available, countries are having to make choices about the content of health insurance plans. The views of the general population can help determine such priorities. In this article, we investigate whether preferences of the general...

Beginning in 2003, Turkey initiated a series of reforms under the Health Transformation Program (HTP) that over the past decade have led to the achievement of universal health coverage (UHC). The progress of Turkey?s health system has few, if any, parallels in scope and speed. Before the...

While universal health coverage (UHC) offers a powerful goal for a nation, all countries-irrespective of income are struggling with achieving or sustaining UHC. France is a high-income country where HC is in effect universal. Health-related costs are covered by a mix of mandatory social health...

According to the 2008 National Demographic and Health Survey (NDHS) report, children under 5 are more likely to use in-patient care than other age groups. These children are not only more vulnerable to getting sick, but are also at risk of incurring high health expenditures if they are without...

Beginning in 2003, Turkey initiated a series of reforms under the Health Transformation Program (HTP) that over the past decade have led to the achievement of universal health coverage (UHC). The progress of Turkey?s health system has few ? if any ? parallels in scope and speed. Before the...

This paper examines the role of price in health insurance coverage decisions within the family to guide policy in promoting whole family coverage. We analyze the factors that affect individual health insurance coverage among families, and explore family decisions about whom to cover and whom to...