Subject: txt hcare -
Jon Gruber, a prominent MIT economist who's been been one of the country's leading advocates of Democratic health care reform legislation. Except it now appears that Gruber didn't do a very good job of disclosing an enormous conflict of interest, according to Firedoglake:
He has consistently failed to disclose that he has had a sole-source contract with the Department of Health and Human Services since June 19, 2009 to consult on the “President’s health reform proposal.”
He is one source for the claim that the excise tax will result in raises for workers (though his underlying study is in-apt to the excise tax question). He is the basis for the argument that the Senate bill reduces families’ risk–even if it remains totally unaffordable. Even Politico stenographer Mike Allen points to Gruber’s 'research'.
But none of the references to Gruber I’ve seen have revealed that Gruber has a $297,600 contract with HHS [U.S. Department of Health and Human Services] to produce,
It gets worse -- Gruber actually failed to disclose $392,600 worth of contracts with HHS. Gruber mounts a very weak defense of himself over at Politico, noting that he did disclose his work with HHS on a few occasions, and that he would disclose it if he was asked. But it should have been disclosed every time his name was mentioned in conjunction with health care.
It's hard not to see this as dishonesty.
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