In The News

Dr. Merrill Matthews, IPI resident scholar, tells OneNewsNow that John Roberts saved the president's "bacon" by siding with the four liberal justices and upholding most of ObamaCare, including the individual mandate, as constitutional under Congress' taxing powers.

“It’s as if Chief Justice John Roberts went out of his way to hand President Obama a victory,” said IPI's Merrill Matthews. "And now that the Supreme Court has upheld Obamacare, let’s see if the public also upholds it come November."

The fallout from the Supreme Court’s split decision this week on Arizona’s tough immigration law could give GOP nominee Mitt Romney and his party a fresh opportunity to reframe the immigration debate and cut into President Obama’s huge lead among Hispanic voters, Merrill Matthews tells Washington Times reporter Ralph Hallow.

There are many ironies in the furor around the individual mandate, writes Ezra Klein in the Washington Post. One is that there is no better deal in the legislation — and there has perhaps never been a better deal in the individual health-care market — than to go without insurance and pay the mandate’s penalty.

Mobile apps, with their extraordinary reach, have the power to transform health care. IPI's Merrill Matthews is cited by reporter Dina ElBoghdady in the Washington Post and Chicago Tribune on the classic showdown occuring between Washington regulators charged with safeguarding the public's health and a freewheeling tech industry that prizes agility and first-to-market bragging rights.

Income inequality appears to be growing in the United States.  And while President Obama didn’t initiate the trend, his health care legislation will dramatically exacerbate it.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen introduced the Invest in America Now Act this week to extend 100% bonus depreciation through 2012 to encourage capital investments and job growth. A statement cites as background information evidence from IPI's 2001 study that every $1 of tax cuts devoted to accelerated depreciation generates about $9 of GDP growth.

Dr. Merrill Matthews, IPI health care expert, is available for interview to offer analysis throughout ongoing coverage of the historic Supreme Court decision regarding the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, expected next week.

The so-called Bush tax cuts are set to expire at the end of the year. That means that all of the current income tax rates will rise to pre-2001 levels overnight. But there's more. The health care law imposes a new 3.8% tax on passive income, including dividends and interest. So the effective dividend tax rate for those at the upper end of the income scale would nearly triple, to 43.4%. Happy New Year!

President Obama denies regulations have grown during his tenure, even as he and his administration have pushed for a massive regulatory expansion in the health care, financial and energy industries.