Backed by a broad coalition of business, civic, and education organizations, on April 26 the House took bold action to provide desperately needed fiscal relief to cities and towns by giving municipal leaders the same flexibility as the state to control their soaring health care costs and preserve…

To supplement our report on retiree health care liabilities, the Foundation is in the process of collecting such data for all cities and towns in Massachusetts. This spreadsheet includes new data from 50 additional municipalities, along with updated data for some of the largest 50 municipalities.…

To supplement our report on retiree health care liabilities, the Foundation is in the process of collecting such data for all cities and towns in Massachusetts. This spreadsheet includes new data from 50 additional municipalities, along with updated data for some of the largest 50 municipalities.…

Municipal employee health care plans in Massachusetts are far more costly and generous than other employer-sponsored plans in the Commonwealth, according to Municipal Health Plans: Gilded Benefits from a Bygone Era, a new report released today by The Boston Foundation and the Massachusetts…

The Foundation calls on legislators and candidates to address the unsustainable increase in municipal costs of health care and pensions that are leading to layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters and recommends a series of changes that would save hundreds of millions of dollars annually in the…

In a letter to conferees, the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation urges legislators to reject the Senate proposal to address the issue of soaring municipal health care costs and take decisive action to provide municipal relief. Cities and towns should have unfettered powers over health plan design,…

Controlling health care costs is a hugely complicated undertaking. In our collective frustration with the complexity of the challenge, let's not take actions that will only make the problem worse. Arbitrary price controls have a superficial appeal, but the economic and other consequences could be…

A special section on health care in the Wall Street Journal of October 27, 2009 included two opinion pieces debating the merits of Massachusetts' health reform law, with MTF President Michael J. Widmer describing the law's success at achieving near universal health insurance coverage. Despite the…

Despite claims to the contrary, the Foundation's recently released analysis of the costs to taxpayers of achieving near-universal access to health care showed that the average yearly increase was only $88 million, well within original estimates. Because of health reform, employee-sponsored…