Browsed by
Author: dzadmin

Facing public backlash, some health care companies are abandoning hospital deals

Facing public backlash, some health care companies are abandoning hospital deals

Anna Claire Vollers | (TNS) Stateline.org

Worried about hospitals closing and higher costs for patients, state lawmakers are increasingly tangling with hospitals over potential health care mergers, in some cases derailing deals they think don’t serve the public interest.

Financially strapped hospitals often look to merge with or be acquired by other systems. After a pandemic-era slowdown, health care mergers and acquisitions have risen steadily over the past two years. But some proposed hospital deals in Connecticut, Louisiana, Minnesota and elsewhere have fizzled amid heavy pushback from lawmakers, organized labor and grassroots organizations.

At least 10 health care “megadeals” were called off or unwound just last year, due in part to increased oversight, reported Becker’s Hospital Review, an industry publication.

“We have seen situations nationally in certain health care transactions where a lot of promises were made, but when you look into it, clinics are closing, prices are going up, access is down,” Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Democrat, told Stateline. read more

Wendy’s isn’t the first: Dynamic pricing is everywhere

Wendy’s isn’t the first: Dynamic pricing is everywhere

By Anna Helhoski | NerdWallet

When word got around that the burger chain Wendy’s would start surging prices in 2025, the backlash was swift. What followed was a swarm of media coverage, outraged customers, late-night TV jokes and a bevy of spicy memes.

It seemed the fast food chain’s alleged dastardly plans were dead on arrival. That is, they might have been if surging prices for your Frosty and fries was what Wendy’s was really planning to do. Wendy’s quickly clarified that it wasn’t surge pricing, after all; it was actually using “dynamic pricing.” That distinction is key, but it’s still business-school speak that’s not clear to most people.

“I think they didn’t think through how people would interpret that phrase,” says Robert Shumsky, a professor of operations management at Dartmouth University’s Tuck School of Business.

Here’s the difference: Surge pricing uses real-time supply and demand data to raise — and only raise — prices. If you’ve ever tried to get a rideshare during rush hour, you’ve experienced how surge pricing hikes up the cost of your fare. Dynamic pricing, on the other hand, uses real-time supply and demand data to fluctuate prices up or down. read more

More medical-marijuana licenses could go to Black Florida farmers

More medical-marijuana licenses could go to Black Florida farmers

TALLAHASSEE — State lawmakers have signed off again on expanding the number of medical-marijuana licenses earmarked for Black farmers, opening the door for three applicants who lost out earlier.

Expansion of such licenses was included in a wide-ranging Department of Health bill (SB 1582) that also addresses such issues as septic-tank inspections and screening for newborns and pregnant women.

A provision added to the bill in the last week of this year’s legislative session would help at least three Black farmers who had sought medical-pot licenses but were deemed ineligible to apply by state officials.

Passage of the bill is the latest twist in a drawn-out effort to allow Black farmers to join the state’s cannabis program, which has exploded in size since voters approved a constitutional amendment broadly authorizing medical marijuana in 2016.

If signed into law by Gov. Ron DeSantis, the bill would bring to six the number of potentially lucrative medical-marijuana licenses earmarked for Black farmers with ties to decades-old litigation about discriminatory lending practices by federal officials. read more