Alaska sued over decision to implement Obamacare Medicaid expansion

We've mentioned before that Alaska is among the latest states to join a slow but steady trend toward accepting the Medicaid expansion enacted as part of the Affordable Care Act but rendered optional by the Supreme Court's 2012 ruling on the constitutionality of the law. Unable to block the governor's decision to accept the Medicaid […]

Dep’t of Education to overhaul rules on student-debt forgiveness

The Washington Post reports: The Obama administration said Wednesday it will overhaul the loan forgiveness process for students who believe they have been defrauded by their colleges, in light of the collapse of controversial for-profit Corinthian Colleges. Students can apply to have their federal loans discharged if they can prove a school used illegal or deceptive tactics in violation […]

Paper Analyzes Testing of Consumer Disclosures

Talia B Gillis, a doctoral student at Harvard, has written Putting Disclosure to the Test: Toward Better Evidence-Based Policy. Here is the abstract: Financial disclosures no longer enjoy the immunity from criticism they once had. While disclosures remain the hallmark of numerous areas of regulation, there is increasing skepticism as to whether disclosures are understood […]

“The Pain Medication Conundrum”

…is the title of this thoughtful NYT piece, which considers the difficult balance doctors must strike in helping patients manage debilitating pain while avoiding feeding addition. The quote sums it up well: A 2011 report from the Institute of Medicine highlighted how poorly the medical field handles pain. Undertreating pain, we [doctors] are admonished, violates […]

Anti-SLAPP Statute Extended to Wage Claim by Authors of Content of Public Interest

by Paul Alan Levy Techdirt carries a discussion  of a recent decision dismissing a class action complaint filed against Yelp on behalf of Yelp users contending that, because their reviews provide content that allows Yelp to profit through the sale of advertising, reviewers are employees who are entitled to payment for their labor under the […]

Read this article: “The Lien Machine: New breed of investor profits by financing surgeries for desperate women patients”

The article was written by Reuters' reporters Alison Frankel and Jessica Dye. Here's a little taste of it: In the little known world of medical lending, financiers invest in operations to remove pelvic implants from women suing device makers – and reap an inflated share of the payouts when cases settle. * * * Previously […]

Court decision destabilizes First Amendment law, with negative consequences for consumers

At the New York Times, reporter Adam Liptak writes about the Supreme Court's June decision in Reed v. Town of Gilbert and explains why what might have been an unremarkable First Amendment case may have significant consequences for a wide range of laws, including consumer protection laws. The key move in Justice Thomas’s [majority] opinion […]