July 2023 Mercatus on Healthcare

Updates on healthcare research and commentary from the Mercatus Center's Open Health Project

This month, we bring you a variety of insights on Medicaid and Medicare that drive home an important lesson: Top-down planning in healthcare doesn’t work. Our scholars document issues related to Medicaid and Medicare payment policies and the effects on patients and clinicians, and they make recommendations to bring about value-based care and improve quality and access.

Medicaid

Cash as Medicine? (blog post)

Markus Bjoerkheim and Liam Sigaud discuss possible options for giving patients more choice and flexibility to apply the Medicaid benefits to their care or coverage through a cash payment option.

Is Medicaid Expansion Devouring State Budgets? (blog post)

Liam Sigaud breaks down how Medicaid expansion impacts the budget priorities of states and finds that the data show less of a “crowd out” than some might assume.

Markus Bjoerkheim presented our forthcoming working paper, co-authored with Liam Sigaud and Kofi Ampaabeng, titled "The Effect of the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid Expansion on the Mental Health of Already-Enrolled Medicaid Beneficiaries" at ASHECON in St. Louis, MO. ASHECON is the annual conference for the American Society of Health Economists, and Markus's presentation shared important insights about the mental health trade-offs imposed by the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid Expansion.

Medicare

Medicare Spending: Physician Services Are a Much Bigger Problem than Drug Prices (blog post)

Elise Amez-Droz, explains how the incentives of Medicare Part B, which pays for outpatient physician services, will continue to drive up healthcare spending and suggests a stronger focus on Medicare Part C to improve efficiency and drive down cost.

Healthcare Access and Quality

Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression in U.S. Adults Remain Elevated (blog post)

Liam Sigaud lays out survey data which demonstrate persistently negative trends in mental health following the pandemic.

Drug Shortages and Drug Pricing Polices (blog post)

Kofi Ampaabeng discusses the complexities in the current shortages in generic drugs and the variety of ways that drug safety and pricing interact with one another.