Each year, millions of workers in the United States develop a chronic illness, disability, or other serious medical problem. Many are at risk of exiting the labor force, especially if they do not receive timely and effective return-to-work (RTW) supports. These workers and their families...

In July 2012, the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) awarded cooperative agreements to a select group of programs proposing innovative ways to improve the quality and lower the cost of care for Medicare, Medicaid, and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) enrollees....

The Affordable Care Act authorized the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to test innovative health care payment and service delivery models with the potential to lower spending on Medicare, Medicaid, and Children’s...

Over 1.2 million seriously disabled Americans under age 65—including as many as 400,000 without health insurance—are currently in the two-year waiting period for Medicare coverage, according to this new report. Eliminating this waiting period would provide stable health insurance...

Congress established the Medicaid Buy-In program when it passed the Balanced Budget Act (BBA) of 1997 and the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Improvement Act (Ticket Act) of 1999. Under the program, so named because participants “buy into†Medicaid by paying monthly premiums or...

Representative Paul Ryan's proposed 2012 budget has been lauded as a path to prosperity, with much attetion given to his overhaul of the medicare system. Using data from the CBO analysis of the Ryan plan, this issue brief demonstrates that any savings to the government under the revamped...

Representative Ryan’s proposal to replace the current Medicare systemwith a system of vouchers or premium supports has been widely described as shifting costs from the government to beneficiaries. However, the size of this shift is actually small relative to the projected increase in costs...

Americans pay far higher prices for prescription drugs than do people in other wealthy countries. The reason that other countries spend so much less on drugs is that their governments negotiate prices with the pharmaceutical industry. The United States government could adopt the same approach...

When Congress was debating the Medicare drug benefit in 2003, there were many who advocated that Medicare provide the benefit as part of the traditional hospital insurance program. This was expected to save money both due to lower administrative costs and also as result of Medicare’s ability...