Health Care’s Other “Big Deal”: Direct Primary Care Regulation in Contemporary American Health Law

Direct primary care is a promising, market-based alternative to the fee-for-service payment structure that shapes doctor–patient relationships in America. Instead of billing patients and insurers service by service, direct primary care doctors charge their patients a periodic, prenegotiated fee in exchange for providing a wide range of healthcare services and increased availability compared to traditional practices. This “subscription” model is intended to eliminate the administrative burdens associated with insurer interaction, which, in theory, allows doctors to spend more time with their patients and less time doing paperwork. Direct practices have become increasingly popular since Congress passed the Affordable Care Act (ACA). This growth has been driven by legislation in several states that resolves a number of legal questions that slowed the model’s growth and by the ACA’s recognition of the model as a permissible way to cover primary care in “approved” health plans. Yet legal scholars have hardly focused on direct primary care. Given the model’s growth, however, the time is ripe for a more focused legal inquiry. This Note begins that inquiry. After tracing the model’s evolution and its core components, this Note substantively examines the laws in states that regulate direct practices and analyzes how those laws address a number of potential policy concerns. It then analyzes direct primary care’s broader role in the contemporary American healthcare marketplace. Based upon that analysis, this Note concludes that direct primary care is a beneficial innovation that harmonizes well with a cooperative-federalism-based healthcare policy model

Seeking Rights, Not Rent: How Litigation Finance Can Help Break Music Copyright\u27s Precedent Gridlock

Since its inception, litigation finance has steadily grown in prevalence and popularity in the United States. While many scholars have examined its merits, few have considered litigation finance specifically in the context of copyright law. This is most unfortunate, for there, a vicious cycle has taken hold: high litigation costs discourage many market participants from taking cases to trial or summary judgment in order to vindicate their legal rights, even when they have strong cases. Thus, parties settle almost every case, which in turn prevents resolution of longstanding precedential questions in critical areas of copyright law. The legal uncertainty resulting from this precedential gridlock generates higher avoidance costs and poses more financial risks for market participants, particularly less-heeled or less-established parties. This Note proposes one way in which litigation finance could help break that cycle. Specifically, rights holders and defendants alike can use litigation finance to fund strategic-litigation campaigns to pressure the development of precedent. To illustrate how this might work, this Note examines litigation finance in the narrow context of music copyright, an area that perfectly illustrates the problems besetting copyright law writ large. In doing so, this Note flips a popular criticism of litigation finance on its head: while some scholars argue that litigation finance can distort litigation strategy by encouraging litigants to reject mutually beneficial settlements, it is normatively desirable to do so given the unsettled state of music copyright law

DISCUSSION: AN AMERICAN PROCESSOR'S PERSPECTIVE

Agribusiness,

Hydrologic-economic Feasibility Study on Precipitation Augmentation Over the Great Lakes

published or submitted for publicationis peer reviewedOpe

Observations of the Non-Thermal X-ray Emission from the Galactic Supernova Remnant G347.3-0.5

G347.3-0.5 (RX J1713.7-3946) is a member of the new class of shell-type Galactic supernova remnants (SNRs) that feature non-thermal components to their X-ray emission. We have analyzed the X-ray spectrum of this SNR over a broad energy range (0.5 to 30 keV) using archived data from observations made with two satellites, the Roentgenstaellit (ROSAT) and the Advanced Satellite for Cosmology and Astrophysics (ASCA), along with data from our own observations made with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE). Using a combination of the models EQUIL and SRCUT to fit thermal and non-thermal emission, respectively, from this SNR, we find evidence for a modest thermal component to G347.3-0.5's diffuse emission with a corresponding energy of kT = 1.4 keV. We also obtain an estimate of 70 TeV for the maximum energy of the cosmic-ray electrons that have been accelerated by this SNR.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, to appear in "Neutron Stars in Supernova Remnants" (ASP Conference Proceedings), eds P. O. Slane and B. M. Gaensle

Investigation of the Quantitative Determination of Point and Areal Precipitation by Radar Echo Measurements: Fourth Quarterly Technical Report

published or submitted for publicationis peer reviewedOpe

Driven waves in a two-fluid plasma

We study the physics of wave propagation in a weakly ionised plasma, as it applies to the formation of multifluid, MHD shock waves. We model the plasma as separate charged and neutral fluids which are coupled by ion-neutral friction. At times much less than the ion-neutral drag time, the fluids are decoupled and so evolve independently. At later times, the evolution is determined by the large inertial mismatch between the charged and neutral particles. The neutral flow continues to evolve independently; the charged flow is driven by and slaved to the neutral flow by friction. We calculate this driven flow analytically by considering the special but realistic case where the charged fluid obeys linearized equations of motion. We carry out an extensive analysis of linear, driven, MHD waves. The physics of driven MHD waves is embodied in certain Green functions which describe wave propagation on short time scales, ambipolar diffusion on long time scales, and transitional behavior at intermediate times. By way of illustration, we give an approximate solution for the formation of a multifluid shock during the collision of two identical interstellar clouds. The collision produces forward- and reverse J shocks in the neutral fluid and a transient in the charged fluid. The latter rapidly evolves into a pair of magnetic precursors on the J shocks, wherein the ions undergo force free motion and the magnetic field grows monotonically with time. The flow appears to be self similar at the time when linear analysis ceases to be valid.Comment: 18 pages including 24 figures, accepted by MNRA

Feasibility study of a long duration balloon flight with NASA/GSFC and Soviet Space Agency Gamma Ray Spectrometers

A feasibility study of conducting a joint NASA/GSFC and Soviet Space Agency long duration balloon flight at the Antarctic in Jan. 1993 is reported. The objective of the mission is the verification and calibration of gamma ray and neutron remote sensing instruments which can be used to obtain geochemical maps of the surface of planetary bodies. The gamma ray instruments in question are the GRAD and the Soviet Phobos prototype. The neutron detectors are supplied by Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Soviet Phobos prototype. These are to be carried aboard a gondola that supplies the data and supplies the power for the period of up to two weeks

ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY CONSIDERATIONS IN THE GRAIN-LIVESTOCK SUBSECTORS IN CANADA, MEXICO AND THE UNITED STATES

Environmental Economics and Policy,

Shepherd's Dilemma

Recent outbreaks of Rift Valley Fever in sheep have led to boycotts of African livestock by Middle Eastern importers. To normalize trade, attempts have been made to apply new livestock forecasting and monitoring technologies. In this process, producers have exhibited a resistance in revealing livestock health information, a resistance that could jeopardize the information system and lead to further boycotts. We investigate the incentives governing this problem and model the most fundamental contract issues, those concerning reputation and credibility. Equilibrium contracts require that the buyer compensate the producer for private information to address the shepherd's dilemma of concealing livestock information (and facing continued boycotts) or revealing the information and being blacklisted.Livestock Production/Industries,