Social Security's financial outlook continues to worsen, yet many policymakers continue to promote higher payroll taxes as the primary solution. New analysis suggests that approach would impose significant costs on workers while doing little to address the program's underlying problem. A recent Cato Institute analysis found that Social Security's Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund is now projected to become insolvent in 2032, one year earlier than previously expected.

The Biden administration's health care legacy continues to create problems for taxpayers, patients, and the broader health care system. Years after key policies were enacted, the effects are still visible in Obamacare enrollment data and in the implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act's drug price controls. The Trump administration has begun reversing several of these policies, but significant work remains. Biden’s Drug Price Controls Continue to Raise Concerns A recent

A proposal to impose a wealth tax on Americans is drawing attention not only for the size of the tax increase, but also for the extensive financial reporting and international coordination that would be required to enforce it. Recent analysis from Americans for Tax Reform examined Graham Platner’s tax agenda and found that it includes a 6 percent annual wealth tax as well as support for international efforts to establish a coordinated minimum tax on wealth. Such proposals rai

Four state Medicaid directors will testify before the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee this Thursday as lawmakers investigate billions of dollars in potential waste, fraud, and abuse within state Medicaid programs. The hearing, organized by the Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, will examine fraud risks, oversight failures, and the safeguards states have in place to protect taxpayer-funded health care programs. State Medicaid directors from New Yor

The Trump Administration has taken a major step toward addressing a longstanding problem in the global pharmaceutical market: wealthy foreign governments benefiting from American medical innovation while using government price controls to pay artificially low prices for the medicines their citizens use. On June 18, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer announced the initiation of a Section 301 investigation into Germany's pharmaceutical pricing practices. The investigation

One of the more surprising developments in the retirement policy debate is coming from the political left. A new explainer from the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA), an organization generally associated with progressive economic policy, acknowledges that the Trump administration's proposed TrumpIRA initiative could help millions of workers who currently lack access to workplace retirement plans. While disagreements remain over implementation and long-term

A federal program created to help vulnerable patients access affordable medications has increasingly become a financial windfall for large tax-exempt hospital systems. The Trump administration's proposed 340B Rebate Model Pilot Program seeks to bring greater transparency and accountability to a program that now exceeds $80 billion in annual discounted drug purchases. The Health Resources and Services Administration recently announced a request for information on a pilot progr

Americans are not imagining the affordability crisis. Real wages have stopped gaining ground, inflation remains embedded in household budgets, and new cost pressures from tariffs and energy instability are making everyday life more expensive. According to New York Times economics reporter Ben Casselman, inflation-adjusted wages have shown no net gain since President Trump returned to office. Price increases over the past few months have erased the real wage gains workers made

Obamacare created several costly federal programs, but the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) has become one of its clearest failures. The agency was supposed to reduce healthcare costs and improve quality through new payment models. Instead, it has spent billions of taxpayer dollars while producing little evidence that it has improved care or delivered savings. Congress now has an opportunity to end this wasteful experiment. Rep. Aaron Bean has introduced H.R