Should-Read: David Anderson : Aetna, CVS and data thoughts : "This is a risk adjustment data gold mine... ...Aetna has ... [feedly]

Should-Read: David Anderson : Aetna, CVS and data thoughts : "This is a risk adjustment data gold mine... ...Aetna has ...
http://www.bradford-delong.com/2017/12/should-read-david-anderson-aetna-cvs-and-data-thoughtshttpswwwballoon-juicecom20171204aetna-cvs-and-data-t.html

Should-Read: David Anderson: Aetna, CVS and data thoughts: "This is a risk adjustment data gold mine...

...Aetna has a kick-ass data team. They have huge and deep data sets that they control. It is quite likely that a significant chunk of their risk adjusted covered lives in 2018 have shown up in some point in their data bases in the past decade. An individual who is now insured by Aetna Medicare Advantage in Texas may have had an amputation claim from Aetna Medicaid in Pennsylvania that is dated in 2009. That is valuable information to build and curate a risk adjustment optimization list. However there are always serious holes in the Aetna list.... This is where CVS comes in. There is a good chance that CVS has filled some prescriptions for people who do not show up in Aetna's data banks....

The other side... is that Aetna will have far more granular level information on their markets. This will influence plan design, it will influence marketing materials, it will influence whether or not Aetna enters or leaves a market or bids for certain contracts.

Finally, the biggest data bonanza from my point of view is the CVS non-prescription data that is tied to the loyalty card that almost everyone carries on their keychain. This should give a massive predictive edge to the Aetna data geeks. Let me share way too much personal.... If an insurer could see the non-prescription purchases tied to the customer loyalty card, they had an excellent idea of when my wife and I started trying for Kid #2. If this was an insurer that sought to be socially productive and useful, we could expect to get mailings and outreach calls on pre-natal and perhaps pre-conception health enhancers. If the insurer was run by cynical bastards and the time of the year was right, they might try to be enough of a pain in the ass to get us to switch insurers so that someone else could pay for labor and delivery....

This merger offers an incredibly rich vein of data that can be mined and minted. This makes a lot of sense to me without even thinking about how the entire pharmacy benefit management function is a messed up situation.

 -- via my feedly newsfeed

Larr Summers: Trump’s version of capitalism looks a lot like revenge — and it endangers our democracy [feedly]

Trump's version of capitalism looks a lot like revenge — and it endangers our democracy
http://larrysummers.com/2017/11/28/trumps-version-of-capitalism-looks-a-lot-like-revenge-and-it-endangers-our-democracy/

In response to the Carrier caper after the election last year, I decried the Trump administration's preference for what I called ad hoc deal capitalism. I noted that the practice was characteristic of developing countries and earlier times in the United States and that it was much less conducive to prosperity and freedom than capitalism based on the predictable rule of law.

Until last month, there had been fewer cases of deal capitalism than I had feared. But in the last month, policy has taken an ugly turn toward the selective and ad hoc use of government power — not to reward political friends but to punish political adversaries. Government rewards encourage cronyism and rent-seeking and waste public resources. Targeting adversaries may chill dissent and threaten democracy.

Two examples stand out.

First, the tax bill contains a provision directed at the investment income of large private university endowments. The revenue raised by such a move could be offset by raising the corporate tax rate from 20 percent to 20.03 percent, so the revenue impact is trivial. There might be a case for revisiting the taxation of nonprofits and looking at issues like unrelated business income, excessive accumulation, diversion of funds for private benefit or the perpetuation of privilege. But it is hard to see any principled tax policy case for focusing only on large private university endowments and not those of state universities, operas or hospitals.

As numerous congressional figures have made clear, however, the motivation behind the proposal is simple. They believe it is time to punish universities for their opposition to Republican positions and their advancement of what they see as "political correctness." I have some sympathy with concerns about ideological diversity at universities, but using the tax system to punish them is inconsistent with any reasonable principle of taxation and with the idea of a free society. If sectors of our society come to think that they cannot speak out on issues of public concern for fear of retribution, our democracy will be traduced.

Second, the targeting by the Justice Department of the proposed AT&T-Time Warner merger invites suspicion of selective prosecution. There are, to be sure, legitimate arguments for attacking vertical combinations of the type this deal represents, and many across the political spectrum have called for enhanced antitrust enforcement. But, again, the circumstances here are suspicious.

In every other area of public policy, the administration has come down on the side of more freedom for businesses to do as they wish and reliance on market forces rather than on regulatory discipline. Indeed, the administration's position on net neutrality only makes sense if one is relatively unconcerned with the possibility of carriers like AT&T having monopoly power. Moreover, the head of the antitrust division, Makan Delrahim, was recently of the view that the merger was not problematic. And rumors that President Trump's anger with CNN could affect the merger have been pervasive, with Trump taking the extraordinary step of publicly commenting on Justice Department enforcement actions.

This kind of thing is not without precedent. President Richard Nixon's enemies list was intended in part to influence policy toward his adversaries. But I believe that the Trump administration's selective economic punishment of political opponents is a targeted attack on our democratic values, and I hope the business community, and at least a few Republicans in Congress, will speak out

 -- via my feedly newsfeed

In Case You Missed It… [feedly]

In Case You Missed It…
https://www.cbpp.org/blog/in-case-you-missed-it-382

This week at CBPP, we focused on federal taxes, the federal budget, state budgets and taxes, health, food assistance, housing, and the economy.

 -- via my feedly newsfeed

Enlighten Radio Podcasts:The Moose Turd Cafe--"Fight for Blood? I'm Yr Huckleberry. That's JUST my game..."

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Blog: Enlighten Radio Podcasts
Post: The Moose Turd Cafe--"Fight for Blood? I'm Yr Huckleberry. That's JUST my game..."
Link: http://podcasts.enlightenradio.org/2017/12/the-moose-turd-cafe-fight-for-blood-im.html

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Enlighten Radio Podcasts:The Moose Turd Cafe: "If you don't like it -- Learn to Cook!"

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Blog: Enlighten Radio Podcasts
Post: The Moose Turd Cafe: "If you don't like it -- Learn to Cook!"
Link: http://podcasts.enlightenradio.org/2017/12/the-moose-turd-cafe-if-you-dont-like-it.html

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Schrodingers Tax Hike: Paul Krugman

Schroedinger's Tax Hike

paul krugman

November 24, 2017 12:26 pm November 24, 2017 12:26 pm

​

Yes, I know that's supposed to be an umlaut in the title. I just can't persuade WordPress to do it.

So: There are many amazing things about the Republican tax pitch, where by "amazing" I mean terrible. But possibly the most amazing of all is the attempt to have it both ways on the question of middle-class taxes.

The Senate bill, as written, tries to be long-run deficit-neutral — allowing use of the Byrd rule to bypass a filibuster — by offsetting huge corporate tax cuts with higher taxes on individuals, so that by 2027 half the population, and most of the middle-class, would see taxes go up. But those tax hikes are initially offset by a variety of temporary tax breaks.

Now, Republicans are arguing that those tax breaks won't actually be temporary, that future Congresses will extend them. But they also need to assume that those tax breaks really will expire in order to meet their budget numbers. So the temporary tax breaks need, for political purposes, to be both alive and dead.

If they succeed in this exercise in quantum budgeting, we'll eventually open the box, collapsing the wave function, and discover whether the budget promise or the tax claim was a lie. But for now, they want to hold it all in suspension. Once upon a time you wouldn't have imagined they could get away with it. Now …

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John Case
Harpers Ferry, WV

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Enlighten Radio Podcasts:Resistance Radio: Irreconcilable Opposition: The Tax Scam

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Blog: Enlighten Radio Podcasts
Post: Resistance Radio: Irreconcilable Opposition: The Tax Scam
Link: http://podcasts.enlightenradio.org/2017/12/resistance-radio-irreconcilable.html

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