The Politics of Medicare (Social Institutions and Social Change Series)

On July 30, 1965, President Johnson flew to Independence, Missouri to sign the Medicare bill. The new statute included two related insurance programs to finance substantial portions of the hospital and physician expenses incurred by Americans over the age of sixty-five. Public attempts to improve American health standards have typically precipitated bitter debate, even as the issue has shifted from the professional and legal status of physicians to the availability of hospital care and public health programs. In The Politics of Medicare, Marmor helps the reader understand Medicare's origins, and he interprets the history of the program and explores what happened to Medicare politically as it turned from a legislative act in the mid-1960s to a major program of American government in the three decades since. This is a vibrant study of an important piece of legislation that asks and answers several questions: How could the American political system yield a policy that simultaneously appeased anti-governmental biases and used the federal government to provide a major entitlement? How was the American Medical Association legally overcome yet placated enough to participate in the program? And how did the Medicare law emerge so enlarged from earlier proposals that themselves had caused so much controversy?

• Remedy and Reaction: The Peculiar American Struggle over Health Care Reform, Revised Edition
• The Social Transformation of American Medicine: The Rise of a Sovereign Profession and the Making of a Vast Industry
• In Sickness and in Wealth: American Hospitals in the Twentieth Century
• The Heart of Power, With a New Preface: Health and Politics in the Oval Office
• The Political Life of Medicare (American Politics and Political Economy)
• The Heart of Power: Health and Politics in the Oval Office
• In Sickness And In W
• Dreamland: The True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic
• Poor People's Medicine: Medicaid and American Charity Care since 1965
• Politics, Health, and Health Care: Selected Essays