Many American’s, including presidential candidates from major political parties, have suggested we have a National Convention to amend the U.S. Constitution, most for the purpose of passing a balanced budget amendment. I must admit at times I thought that would be a good idea, but then, like Sen. Marco Rubio...
Why does Virginia have the highest rate of referring school children to police? A report last April by the Center on Public Integrity, using U.S. Department of Education data, demonstrated that Virginia schools referred students to law enforcement at a rate nearly three times higher than the national average. And...
Once again, the financial numbers from the hospital industry show that it is doing very well overall. Close to 80% of the hospitals in our state are profitable. The number of hospitals running operating deficits have decreased each of the last three years. Our study last month showed that the hospitals...
The revolution in online education continues. It’s just taking longer than it should. Two years ago, the Georgia Institute of Technology partnered with Udacity, a company that runs massively open online courses (MOOCs) and ATT to launch an online masters degree in computer science charging a fraction the cost per...
“We find no evidence that legislated U.S. smoking bans were associated with short term reductions in hospital admissions for [heart attack] acute myocardial infarction or other diseases in the elderly, children or working-age adults.” This startling conclusion comes from four authors in the Congressional Budget Office, RAND Corporation, Center for...
Much of today’s urban transportation planning focuses on transit and “smart growth.” According to this set of ideas, suburbanization (aka “sprawl”) is bad and should be discouraged, while higher density is good and should be increased, so that “we can get people out of their cars” and do other good...
The recent Paris climate talks became frenzied, as delegates desperately tried to salvage an agreement beyond empty promises to do something sometime about what President Obama insists is the gravest threat to our planet, national security and future generations. Determined for once to lead from upfront, he took a 500-person...
The most recent financial numbers posted on the Virginia Hospital information website show that hospitals overall are doing very well. The combined profit of the reporting hospitals was $1.9 billion, an 8.6 percent increase year-over-year — $150 million more than a year earlier.
... The federal Certificate of Public Need law was originally intended to control costs by requiring State Health Commissioners to limit the supply of health care. But the law has not succeeded. The federal law was repealed in 1987, and states have been repealing their laws as well. Virginia should be...
Jefferson Journal: Hospital Finances Show a Profitable Industry
Once again, the financial numbers from the hospital industry show that it is doing very well overall. Close to 80% of the hospitals in our state are profitable. The number of hospitals running operating deficits has decreased each of the last three years. And the numbers laid out in our...