Health care spending expected to jump
WASHINGTON – The government says health- care spending will jump by 6.1 percent next year as the big coverage expansion in President Barack Obama’s overhaul kicks in.
That’s more than 2 percentage points higher than the growth rate forecast for this year. The rate of growth in health care spending for the past four years has hovered under 4 percent – historically low.
The government attributes much of the increase next year to the new health- care program, which is expected to provide insurance coverage to millions of currently uninsured Americans beginning Jan. 1.
Without it, the projected growth next year would be 4.5 percent.
Court upholds standard for fuel-carbon levels
SAN FRANCISCO – A panel of federal judges Wednesday upheld California’s first-in-the-nation mandate requiring fuel producers to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday rejected arguments from fuel makers that California’s “Low Carbon Fuel Standard” discriminated against out-of-state producers.
The ruling reverses a U.S. District Court ruling in favor of the plaintiffs, and removes an injunction that at one point halted implementation of the law.
The California Air Resources Board, the agency in charge of implementing the standard, appealed, and was able to continue implementing the law while the case was being heard.
The low carbon fuel standard is a key piece of California’s landmark global warming law, AB 32, and is meant to cut the state’s dependence on petroleum by 20 percent and account for one-tenth of the state’s goal to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.
World Trade Center name deal draws fire
NEW YORK – The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey on Wednesday called a deal that sold the World Trade Center’s name rights to a nonprofit organization for $10 decades ago “a shameful episode” and vowed to cooperate with an anticipated investigation by New York’s attorney general.
A newspaper story this month revealed that the name rights were sold to former Port Authority executive Guy Tozzoli in his role as head of the nonprofit World Trade Centers Association, formed to promote international trade.
The Port Authority, which owns the lower Manhattan land where the Twin Towers stood before Sept. 11, 2001, is among more than 300 worldwide members that pay the WTCA a fee to use the words “World Trade Center.”
Associated Press
