Senators at Joint Economic Committee Hearing Cite Hospital Consolidation, Propose Legislative Fixes
At a Joint Economic Committee hearing, two speakers debated how consolidation and policy choices have affected health-care costs, alleging overbilling in Medicare and advocating measures such as the Hospital Competition Act and longer-term insurance contracts to increase competition.
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Speaker 1 criticized provisions of the Affordable Care Act (referred to in the transcript as "Obamacare") and recent policy changes, saying they have encouraged consolidation among hospitals and provider systems and weakened cost controls. The speaker noted the repeal of the Cadillac tax and argued that that removal of a cost-control mechanism reduced private incentives to manage spending.
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