California Watch
News stories in this section spotlight activities in California, including actions by the state Assembly and state Senate; proposed legislation; regulators like the Department of Managed Health Care and Department of Insurance; and the state ACA exchange, Covered California.
Californians have traveled a bumpy road to post-pandemic recovery, with healthy employment and wage growth on the one hand, but soaring inflation and cost-of-living increases on the other.
Jessica Altman took over in March as chief executive officer of Covered California, and even as she was settling into a new home in Sacramento she also was making the rounds with congressional leaders to drive home just how much Californians want access to health insurance. The greatest barrier to getting it is all too ...
Suddenly, California officials are moving toward new indoor mask rules as coronavirus cases enter the danger zone in many parts of the state.
In what has been dubbed the Great Resignation, Americans have been quitting their jobs in record numbers in recent months - a trend that shows no signs of slowing. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, over 4.5 million Americans quit their job in March 2022, the most ever recorded in a single month, and up from 4.4 million quits in February.
California is diving into the prescription drug business, attempting to achieve what no other state has done: produce its own brand of generic insulin and sell it at below-market prices to people with diabetes like Sabrina Caudillo.
In California, Democrats call for "a universal, single-payer healthcare system" as part of their party platform. A bid to install such a system failed in the California Assembly at the end of January, but the Golden State's leaders have promised to make another run at it.
Five California Chamber of Commerce employment-related job killer proposals have moved on to the second house, passing a key legislative deadline on May 27 that required nontax-related bills to pass out of the house in which they were introduced. The following five employment-related bills passed the house of origin deadline on Friday: AB 2183 (Stone; D-Scotts Valley) Forced ...
A controversial push to restrict anti-competitive practices like consolidation in California’s health sector has cleared a major hurdle with its approval from the Assembly last week. Despite consistent disagreements over the bill’s provisions, the Assembly ultimately passed Assembly Bill 2080 with a 45-19 vote. It now needs to clear the Senate. Intended to combat the high health care ...
Since California expanded health coverage under the Affordable Care Act, a large number of people have been mistakenly bounced between Covered California, the state’s marketplace for those who buy their own insurance, and Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program for low-income residents. Small income changes can cause people’s eligibility to shift, but when bad information is typed into ...
A bill that would provide a full sales and use tax exemption for purchases of manufacturing and research and development equipment up to $200 million was advanced by Assembly lawmakers. The bill, which passed the Assembly in a 74-0 vote, expands California’s existing partial sales and use tax exemption for manufacturing and research and development equipment to ...