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Current Topics
The snowiest day in Alaska — and perhaps U.S. — history? ADN
Education
Schools depend on safe roads. ADN
By all accounts, this winter in Anchorage has been off to an unprecedented start. As reported by the ADN, winter storms have dropped more than three feet of snow since last week — a historic amount for November. Because of these unsafe conditions, I had to make the extremely difficult decision to pivot students to remote learning for four days.
Alaska Head Start programs are watching a Biden plan that would increase salaries. Alaska Beacon
The proposed rule would raise the average Head Start teacher salary $10,000, improve benefits, and increase access to mental health supports. These changes are all responses to the early child care workforce crisis that has closed 1 in 5 Head Start classrooms nationwide, despite waiting lists for children to get into programs.
Minerals
Mining exec: Alaska's pricey, fossil duel-based power could thwart investment. Northern Journal
Economy
Alaska minimum wage set to increase in new year; additional hikes proposed in ballot initiative. Alaska Beacon
Alaska’s minimum wage will increase on Jan. 1, 2024 from $10.85 to $11.73 an hour, in accordance with a law put in place by a 2014 citizen initiative, the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development announced.
Zoomers > Boomers Axios
Gen Z is expected to overtake baby boomers in the workforce by next year, per a new analysis of census data from Glassdoor. The workplace is giving more Gen Z energy — and if you don't understand what that means, it's time to bone up on the younger generation's lingo and work style. Zoomers > boomers
We’re fighting to prevent unfair Anchorage utility rate hikes ADN
(My comment: This is the Chugach rate case I told you about a month ago. AARP is one of about 14 interveners in the Regulatory Commission of Alaska case. What is the basis of the rate increase? - Much higher costs of fuel to generate electricity, which is natural gas. The bottom line lesson here is that we have to upgrade transmission so that lower cost clean energy from hydro generation (Bradley Lake) can be dispatched along our grid.)
Politics
Alaska's Permanent Fund needs accounting and legislative oversight. Alaska Beacon
There is a need for accounting and legislative oversight of the Permanent Fund as well as the special Alaska investment portion, which are under the current trustees’ authority.
Health Care
Monthly premiums for health insurance on the federal marketplace will rise 16% in Alaska next year. Alaska Beacon
Monthly bills for Alaskans using the federal health insurance marketplace are set to rise some 16% in 2024 — coming on top of an 18% increase in the previous year that, in total, will bump up costs by more than one-third in a two-year span.
The ‘doctor of nursing practice’ will see you now Alaska Beacon
One reason the issue is being debated now is that there are so many more nurse practitioners. Their numbers more than doubled from 2010-2017, driven by what researchers at Montana State University and Dartmouth College called “a remarkable expansion” in the number of college programs, which now graduate almost as many new nurse practitioners as medical schools do physicians. And the past 15 years have seen an explosion in the number of nurse practitioners earning the relatively new doctor of nursing practice degree, or DNP. It’s a doctoral-level degree, educationally on par with a Ph.D.
Rethinking Medicaid enrollment. Axios
The largest-ever purge of the nation's Medicaid rolls has exposed major cracks in the system for covering the poorest Americans — and is prompting some states to rethink how they connect vulnerable residents to benefits.
FDA beefs up drug ad requirements. Axios
The FDA has finalized a long-running effort to require prescription drug ads on TV and radio to clearly lay out potential side effects and when a person should avoid a medicine. While the number of drug ads has surged and they account for billions of dollars in direct-to-consumer marketing, experts say they primarily rely on emotional appeals and focus on a drug's benefits over potential risks, Axios' Adriel Bettelheim writes. These drug ads, which are banned in all other developed countries besides New Zealand, can influence whether consumers seek out more information about a drug, visit a health care provider to discuss an advertised product, or skip a doctor's visit.
Making dental care "essential" Axios
CMS proposed allowing states to include adult dental services as an "essential health benefit" (EHB) that ACA health plans must cover without annual or lifetime limits. It would reverse a ban on states from including adult dental services as an essential benefit. "Given that oral health has a significant impact on overall health and quality of life" and the high percentage of employers offering dental coverage, it makes sense to revisit the issue, CMS wrote.
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