Industry Updates
This broad category includes articles concerning health insurance costs, carrier and health plan news, changing benefits technology, and surveys by the Kaiser Family Foundation and others on employee benefits.
House negotiators have put two major pharmacy benefit manager provisions in big, “must pass” spending package that’s now speeding toward a vote on the House floor. One provision in the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2026 package would require PBMs to provide employers and other health plan sponsor fiduciaries with detailed prescription drug benefits tracking reports, to help ...
The CEOs of most of the nation’s largest health insurers plan to lay blame for rising healthcare costs on hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and specialty providers during testimony before Congress on Jan. 22. In written testimonies submitted ahead of back-to-back hearings before the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health and the House Ways and Means Committee, the top executives ...
While the conversation at the House E&C Subcommittee hearing this morning was fairly varied, in the early questioning before the Ways and Means Committee, the debate over the Affordable Care Act has been front and center. Ranking Member Richard Neal, D-Massachusetts, said in his opening remarks that the expiry of the enhanced subsidies in the ...
Congressional leaders reached a bipartisan, bicameral health care deal early Tuesday morning they hope lawmakers will pass later this week as part of a four-bill government spending package. Alongside funding for the departments of Defense, Transportation, Labor, Health and Human Services and Homeland Security through Sept. 30, senior appropriators are proposing a crackdown on drug intermediates ...
California’s two largest nonprofit health systems are positioning themselves for major expansion and strategic growth this year, with newly appointed leaders focused on mergers, acquisitions and national partnerships. Oakland-based Kaiser Permanente named Jim Marcotte vice president of mergers and acquisitions and partnership development strategy implementation. Mr. Marcotte previously served as executive director of financial planning and analysis ...
President Donald Trump has hinted at “concepts of a plan” for healthcare for months as legislators debate the future of key subsidies under the Affordable Care Act, and on Thursday the White House unveiled a more concrete version of its vision for health policy. Called “The Great Healthcare Plan,” Trump’s proposal would send the value ...
With the healthcare affordability and insurance premiums in particular in the headlines, a new report finds that while the employer-sponsored space is largely stable, declines continue among smaller firms. The Employee Benefit Research Institute released a report diving into the “shifting landscape” around employer-sponsored health insurance and found that just under half (49%) of employers offered health ...
Republicans finally have a health care plan. Conservatives who sought free-market solutions to America’s exorbitant medical bills in an era before President Donald Trump, and struggled to come up with a plan to replace Obamacare in his first term, would be surprised to see what’s in it. On Thursday, Trump unveiled a sweeping blueprint pressuring ...
The U.S. spent 7.2% more on healthcare in 2024 — not due to higher healthcare prices but instead greater use and more intensity of medical goods and services, especially in hospitals.
The typical U.S. working family spends nearly $4,000 per year on health care, including their share of insurance premiums and out-of-pocket costs, according to a new analysis by the Center for Economic and Policy Research. Why it matters: That’s just the median amount, and plenty of families pay thousands more. But it goes a long way in explaining ...