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Potential Benefits of Universal Access to Retirement Savings: An Analysis of National Options to Expand Coverage (PDF)

55 pages. "Universal access to retirement savings options would give all workers the opportunity to save, and evidence from other countries, from individual states, and from private sector plans suggests that many would begin to do so, especially when encouraged using default options, such as automatic enrollment."

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Potential Benefits of Universal Access to Retirement Savings: An Analysis of National Options to Expand Coverage (PDF)

54 pages. "[N]ational universal workplace access scenarios could reduce the access gap and expand retirement savings coverage by 28 to 40 million workers (depending on the chosen design features) by the year 2040, with additional participation from 50 to 70% of private sector workers currently lacking access.... [By] starting to save early in their careers, through simple, automatic, and consistent contributions, and by capitalizing on incentives to save and compounding investment returns over an extended time horizon, millions of additional private sector workers with typical earnings levels will begin to save and build substantial private savings that will increase their retirement incomes."

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State Progress toward Health Reform Implementation: Timely Analysis of Immediate Health Policy Issues (PDF)

In this paper, we combine information from the National Conference of State Legislatures ... and [HHS] to group states based on their progress toward implementing health insurance exchanges. All designations are current as of January 17, 2011.

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Pension Rights Center Applauds Senator Harkin for Bold Proposal to Solve Nation's Retirement Crisis

"Today the Pension Rights Center applauded Senator Tom Harkin, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, for his new report, The Retirement Crisis and a Plan to Solve It. 'Senator Harkin's bold report identifies the causes of the retirement crisis and proposes imaginative and realistic solutions to the address the crisis,' said Karen Friedman, the Center's executive vice president and policy director.... The Senator's proposal for USA Retirement Funds, a new system of privately-run pension plans, requires that individuals who are not covered by an employer-sponsored retirement plan be automatically enrolled in regulated privately-run retirement funds, in which ... [i]nvestment and life-expectancy risks would be shared by employees and retirees; and [t]he administrative burden on employers would be limited to ensuring that contributions are transmitted to the funds."  MORE >>

Text of Pension Rights Center Policy Director's Speech at 2012 Latino Retirement Security Summit

Speech by Karen Friedman. "[P]eople need to have a secure retirement and, sadly, technology can't fix that issue -- only having adequate income can.... Half of the nation's private-sector workers have neither a pension or savings to supplement Social Security and, as [the] study for National Council on La Raza shows, the situation is even more acute among the Latino population."

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2025 Enforcement Trends: Risk Analysis Failures at the Center of HHS's Multimillion-Dollar HIPAA Penalties

"In the first five months of 2025, [HHS OCR] announced it had entered into ten [HIPAA] resolution agreements reflecting the settlement of alleged HIPAA violations stemming from data breaches reported to OCR.... Each announcement indicates the resolution agreement was intended to cure defects in basic HIPAA Security Rule compliance, with a common emphasis on each organization's failure to conduct a thorough risk analysis consistent with the HIPAA Security Rule."  MORE >>

National Women's Law Center and Other Participant Advocacy Groups Comment Letter to DOL and IRS on Lifetime Income Options from Retirement Plans (PDF)

11 pages. The comments were filed May 3, 2010 on behalf of National Women's Law Center; American Association of University Women (AAUW); American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees; National Consumers League; National Council of Women's Organizations; National Organization for Women (NOW); National Senior Citizens Law Center; National Women's Law Center; Older Women and Economic Security (OWES) Task Force of the National Council of Women's Organizations; OWL - The Voice of Midlife and Older Women; and the Pension Rights Center.

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Speech by Pension Rights Center Policy Director Karen Friedman to the Texas Municipal Retirement System (November 19, 2013)

"From our perspective, the attacks on Social Security, Medicare, public plans, and private plans are part of a wholesale assault on the idea of collective social institutions and shared risk. Those who ultimately wish to privatize Social Security and voucherize Medicare also want to turn guaranteed pension plans into do-yourself savings accounts -- with the risks and responsibilities shouldered entirely by individuals.... The Pension Rights Center believes there has to be a counterweight to the do-it-yourself savings society, where all the risks and responsibilities have been shifted onto individuals. We have been part of a national movement to push for retirement security for all, promoting a vision of shared responsibility to ensure that all working people, whether in government or in the private sector, can retire with decency."  MORE >>

Ensuring the Integrity of Policy Research and Analysis Department's Actuarial Calculations (PDF)

"To ensure the quality of actuarial work products issued by [the Policy Research and Analysis Department, or 'PRAD'], PBGC should take a number of actions, including developing, documenting, and enforcing policies and procedures for quality review of PRAD actuarial work, whether in an issued report or in response to ad hoc inquiries. Other necessary actions include developing, implementing, and enforcing policies to ensure the adequate and efficient review of contractor work performed with PIMS and the retention of supporting documentation for work performed by PRAD actuaries and of all accepted actuarial contractor deliverables.... [B]ased on our review of the changes referenced in the [May 21, 2012] response from PBGC, the revised process is still inadequate to ensure the integrity of PRAD's actuarial estimates."  MORE >>

NCSL Prescription Drug Policy Resource Center

"Prescription drugs account for 10 percent of overall health spending in the U.S.... State and federal governments have focused on successfully managing these costs through a variety of approaches. These include widespread use of increased manufacturer rebates, use of preferred drug lists, prior authorization, state-initiated bulk purchasing and large retailers' competition to offer $4-$10 prescriptions for many widely used drugs."  MORE >>

CBO Analysis of Health Care Spending and Policy Proposals

36 presentation slides. "This presentation describes CBO's general approach to policy analysis and its role in supporting the Congress; summarizes several elements of the agency's projections of health care spending; and reviews examples of policy proposals and approaches affecting health care that CBO has analyzed recently."

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Why Don't Americans Use Cost-Effectiveness Analysis in Health Policy Making? (PDF)

5 pages. Excerpt: Cost-effectiveness analysis ... offers decision makers a structured, rational approach with which to improve the return onresources expended. But decades after its widespread promotion to the medical community, policy makers in the United States remain reluctant to use the approach formally. Indeed, the resistance to economic evidence in the United States in an era of evidence-based medicine in healthcare is perhaps the most notable development of all.

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Public Fund Survey: 2012 Analysis of Nation's Largest Public Retirement Systems

"The funding level in FY 12 declined to 73.5 percent, down from 75.8 percent the prior year. The aggregate actuarial value of assets increased to $2.67 trillion, an increase of 0.9 percent. This increase was outpaced by growth in the actuarial value of liabilities, from $3.49 trillion to $3.63 trillion, or 4.1 percent. Liabilities grow primarily as active (working) plan participants accrue retirement benefit service credits."

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CBO Analysis of S. 534, National Association of Registered Agents and Brokers Reform Act of 2013

"S. 534 would establish the National Association of Registered Agents and Brokers (NARAB) and authorize it to license producers of insurance (mostly agents and brokers) to operate in multiple states.... Under the bill, insurance producers that join the NARAB would be able to obtain a license to act as a producer in any state other than their home state by meeting the NARAB's eligibility requirements and paying certain fees. CBO estimates that enacting S. 534 would increase revenues by $490 million and increase direct spending by $483 million[.]"  MORE >>

Measuring the Health of Nations: Updating an Earlier Analysis

Excerpt: In a Commonwealth Fund-supported study comparing preventable deaths in 19 industrialized countries, researchers found that the United States placed last. While the other nations improved dramatically between the two study periods -- 1997-98 and 2002-03 -- the U.S. improved only slightly on the measure.

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Portman-Cardin Bill Is Unsound Policy That Digs the Nation's Fiscal Hole Deeper

Excerpt: As with earlier Portman-Cardin bills, this measure includes both promising and problematic provisions. Most of the provisions that involve the largest revenue losses, however, represent problematic policy.... [T]hese provisions would make the deficits still larger, primarily by providing additional tax subsidies to high-income individuals. Moreover, most of those individuals would likely save without the new tax breaks ...  MORE >>

Analysis of Proposed Health Reform Policies

"Health reform has remained a hot topic throughout the recent months leading up to the presidential election. Here is a breakdown and analysis of a few proposals put forth during the 2016 presidential campaign.... Completely repeal Obamacare.... Allow individuals to fully deduct health insurance premium payments from their tax returns under the current tax system.... Allow individuals to use Health Savings Accounts (HSAs).... Require price transparency from all healthcare providers"

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Text of DOL/HHS Checklist: Plan or Policy Non-Quantitative Treatment Limitations That Require Additional Analysis to Determine Mental Health Parity Compliance (PDF)

"Language contained in [provisions listed in this checklist] (absent similar restrictions on med/surg benefits) can serve as a red flag that a plan or issuer may be imposing an impermissible [Non-Quantitative Treatment Limitation (NQTL)]. Further review of the processes, strategies, evidentiary standards, or other factors used in applying the NQTL to both [Mental Health or Substance Use Disorder (MH/SUD)] and med/surg benefits will be required to determine parity compliance. Note that these plan/policy terms do not automatically violate the law, but the plan or issuer will need to provide evidence to substantiate compliance. The categories and examples [listed in this document] are not exhaustive and are not a substitute for any regulations or other interpretive guidance issued by the Departments."

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CBO Analysis of Options for Reducing the Deficit Includes Health Policy Proposals (PDF)

316 pages; excerpt from "Options Related to Health": "Most of the 16 options in this chapter would either decrease federal spending on health programs or increase revenues (or equivalently, reduce tax expenditures) as a result of changes in tax provisions related to health care.... [F]ive options address broad approaches to changing federal health care policy, all of which would offer lawmakers a variety of alternative ways to alter current law.... [1] Impose caps on federal spending for Medicaid, [2] Convert Medicare to a premium support system, [3] Change the cost-sharing rules for Medicare and restrict medigap insurance, [4] Bundle Medicare's payments to health care providers, and [5] Reduce tax preferences for employment-based health insurance."

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ISS 2014 Draft Policies Include Significant Change to Pay for Performance Analysis

"ISS will simplify its primary quantitative screen, the Relative Degree of Alignment (RDA) test, which compares the pay and performance of the company's CEO to that of its ISS peer group, so that it is measured over a three-year period only rather than one-year and three-year periods ... The changes appear to be a response to criticism ... since 2011 that a single three-year measure of pay versus performance is more indicative of long-term performance and one-year pay and performance are effectively double-counted under the current policy."

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