Free Republic

The White House lauded a Congressional Budget Office report on the proposed minimum wage hike to $10.10 per hour while brushing off one key finding: that such a bill could cost half a million jobs, and maybe more. “The new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report finds that 16.5 million workers would get a raise from increasing the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour and this would help millions of hard-working families, reduce poverty, and increase the overall wages going to lower-income households,” Jason Furman, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, and Betsey Stevenson, Council of Economic Advisers member, wrote...

A proposed federal rule to cap profit margins for certain health insurance plans and prescription drug benefit programs is now available for review. The latest in a raft of rules required by President Obama’s landmark healthcare law, the proposed rule was drafted by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and sent to Pennsylvania Avenue on Thursday. The White House’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) is moving quickly to issue the proposal, which will hit the Federal Register on Tuesday. That begins a 60-day comment period. CMS will consider all comments before finalizing the rule. The 116-page...

LOS ANGELES — Citing an effort to hold down costs, health insurance giant Blue Cross wants doctors in California to report conditions it could use to cancel new patients' medical coverage, it was reported Tuesday. The state's largest for-profit health insurer is sending physicians copies of health insurance applications filled out by new patients, along with a letter advising them that the company has a right to drop members who fail to disclose "material medical history," the Los Angeles Times reported on its Web site.