Passage of a sweeping bill is now considered a lock by the wisest and most conventional Beltway pundits. And legislation may even include the most shining prize of all, the public option that liberals - no matter what the talking points for public consumption - consider a way station to the Valhalla of a government-controlled system. ...more

November 7, 2009

As I was talking recently with the founder of a large American corporation, the conversation turned (inevitably) to health care reform. His employees in their 20s, on average, cost the company about $1,500 a year in health bills. Those in their 50s cost at least 10 times more. The effect of proposed health care reform - which limits the ability of insurers to charge higher premiums for older adults - would be, he said, a large shift of America's health care burden to the younger generation. ...more

November 4, 2009

The debate about the health care system's overhaul is filled with topics and terms unfamiliar to many. Each week, we'll examine some of the issues, the politics behind them and how they would affect consumers. ...more

October 25, 2009

There are 18 states, as columnist Mark Shields recently pointed out to me, that have gone Democratic in each of the last five presidential elections. Of the 36 senators who represent those states, only two are Republicans. Both are from Maine, one of the last, storm-lashed, surf-pounded footholds of the Yankee GOP. So it is hardly shocking that the lone Republican supporter of Democratic health reform on the Senate Finance Committee should be Maine's Olympia Snowe. ...more

October 21, 2009

I listen and read about all the changes needed to reduce our health care costs and offer everybody insurance. I keep hearing about socialized medicine and how it works (be it good or bad) in Canada and the United Kingdom. ...more

September 8, 2009

The pharmaceutical industry agreed Saturday to spend $80 billion over the next decade improving drug benefits for seniors on Medicare and defraying the cost of President Barack Obama's health care legislation, capping secretive negotiations involving key lawmakers and the White House. ...more

June 21, 2009

WASHINGTON - Angry lawmakers prepared to levy heavy taxes on employee bonuses at insurance giant American International Group Inc. and at other companies that received big U.S. government bailouts. ...more

March 19, 2009

The Internal Revenue Service issued guidelines Tuesday that will allow relief and refunds for some Bernard Madoff victims who were taxed for investment earnings that turned out to be nonexistent. ...more

March 17, 2009

The Internal Revenue Service is eliminating a program that uses private debt collectors to go after tax delinquents, the agency announced Thursday evening. ...more

March 5, 2009

Ron Kirk, the president's choice to be U.S. trade representative, owes an estimated $10,000 in back taxes from earlier in the decade and has agreed to pay them, the Senate Finance Committee said Monday. ...more

March 2, 2009