Medicare Beneficiary Access to Care: The Effects of New Prospective Payment Systems on Outpatient Hospital Care, Home Health Care, and Skilled Nursing Facility Care (open access)

Medicare Beneficiary Access to Care: The Effects of New Prospective Payment Systems on Outpatient Hospital Care, Home Health Care, and Skilled Nursing Facility Care

This report discusses the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 (BBA 97), which required that prospective payment systems replace retrospective cost-based reimbursement systems for Medicare beneficiaries receiving care in hospital outpatient departments, from home health care agencies, and in skilled nursing facilities.
Date: February 2, 2000
Creator: Merck, Carolyn L.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Farm Commodity Legislation: Chronology, 1933-98 (open access)

Farm Commodity Legislation: Chronology, 1933-98

Farm commodity programs were a product of the Great Depression. This report discusses the history of farm commodity legislation. Since 1933, Congress has required the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) to administer a variety of programs providing price support and income protection for the nations farmers.
Date: February 9, 1999
Creator: Becker, Geoffrey S.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Farm Labor Shortages and Immigration Policy (open access)

Farm Labor Shortages and Immigration Policy

This report first explains the connection made over the past several years between farm labor and immigration policies. It next examines the composition of the seasonal agricultural labor force and presents the arguments of grower and farmworker advocates concerning its adequacy relative to employer demand. The report closes with an analysis of the trends in employment, unemployment, time worked and wages of authorized and unauthorized farmworkers to determine whether they are consistent with the existence of a nationwide shortage of domestically available farmworkers.
Date: February 9, 2004
Creator: Levine, Linda
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Immigration of Agricultural Guest Workers: Policy, Trends, and Legislative Issues (open access)

Immigration of Agricultural Guest Workers: Policy, Trends, and Legislative Issues

This report discusses the revision of U.S. immigration policy on agricultural guest workers that are coming from various perspectives, and several major bills have already been introduced in the 107th Congress
Date: February 15, 2001
Creator: Wasem, Ruth Ellen & Collver, Geoffrey K
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Federal Grazing Regulations: Public Lands Council v. Babbitt (open access)

Federal Grazing Regulations: Public Lands Council v. Babbitt

This report discusses new regulations on livestock grazing on lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management became effective August 21, 1995. Many aspects of the new regulations were challenged in Public Lands Council v. Babbitt. A federal district court upheld many of the regulations, but struck down four of them and enjoined their implementation. At the appellate level, only the new regulation allowing conservation use to the exclusion of livestock grazing for the full term of a permit was held invalid. The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the case and argument has been set for March 1, 2000.
Date: February 1, 2000
Creator: Baldwin, Pamela
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Global Climate Change: The Energy Tax Incentives in the President's FY2000 Budget (open access)

Global Climate Change: The Energy Tax Incentives in the President's FY2000 Budget

This report discusses the FY2000 budget, which includes several energy tax incentives intended to reduce greenhouse gasses linked to possible global warming.
Date: February 4, 1999
Creator: Lazzari, Salvatore
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Global Climate Change: Congressional Concern About "Back Door" Implementation of the 1997 U.N. Kyoto Protocol (open access)

Global Climate Change: Congressional Concern About "Back Door" Implementation of the 1997 U.N. Kyoto Protocol

This report discusses legislation and issues relating to global climate change, some legislation and some FY1999 appropriations bills were used as vehicles for explicit congressional direction to the executive branch about possible "back door" implementation of the Kyoto Protocol.
Date: February 3, 1999
Creator: Morrissey, Wayne A.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Global Climate Change (open access)

Global Climate Change

This report discusses the effect of human activities on global climate change. Human activities, particularly burning of fossil fuels, have increased atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) and other trace gases, including chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), methane, and nitrous oxide.
Date: February 25, 2003
Creator: Justus, John R. & Fletcher, Susan R.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Global Climate Change: Market-Based Strategies to Reduce Greenhouse Gases (open access)

Global Climate Change: Market-Based Strategies to Reduce Greenhouse Gases

This report discusses global climate change and the market-based strategies to reduce greenhouse gases.
Date: February 4, 2003
Creator: Parker, Larry
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Global Climate Change: The Role for Energy Efficiency (open access)

Global Climate Change: The Role for Energy Efficiency

This report reviews the role of energy efficiency in federal policies to curb CO2 emissions. In particular, it discusses targets for CO2 reductions, projected energy efficiency impacts, strategies for measuring impacts, and legislative proposals that would affect support for energy efficiency programs.
Date: February 3, 2000
Creator: Sissine, Fred
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Federal Fiscal Year (open access)

The Federal Fiscal Year

This report discusses the federal fiscal year which is the accounting period of the federal government.
Date: February 25, 1999
Creator: Heniff, Bill, Jr.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Formulation and Content of the Budget Resolution (open access)

Formulation and Content of the Budget Resolution

The Congressional Budget Act (CBA) of 1974 (Titles I-IX of P.L. 93-344), as amended, established the concurrent budget resolution as the centerpiece of the congressional budget process. This report discusses the budget resolution, which provides the framework for subsequent legislative action on the annual appropriations bills, revenue measures, debt-limit legislation, reconciliation legislation (if required), and any other budgetary legislation.
Date: February 25, 1999
Creator: Heniff, Bill, Jr.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Higher Education Act: Reauthorization Status and Issues (open access)

The Higher Education Act: Reauthorization Status and Issues

This report discusses the funding authorizations for programs in the Higher Education Act (HEA). This legislation authorizes the federal government’s major student aid programs, as well as other significant initiatives.
Date: February 5, 2003
Creator: Stedman, James B.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
The 0.38 Percent Across-the-Board Cut in FY2000 Appropriations (open access)

The 0.38 Percent Across-the-Board Cut in FY2000 Appropriations

This report outlines cuts made in the federal budget for FY2000. The 0.38% cut was expected to yield savings of $2.4 billion in budget authority and $1.4 billion in outlays for the fiscal year. Departments with cuts in excess of $100 million included the Departments of Defense, Transportation, Health and Human Services, and Education.
Date: February 25, 2000
Creator: Keith, Robert
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Federal Grants to State and Local Governments: A Brief History (open access)

Federal Grants to State and Local Governments: A Brief History

This report discusses the history of the federal grants-in-aid system, which predates the Constitution. he grants-in-aid system assumed its current form when President Franklin D. Roosevelt initiated his New Deal programs. Since Roosevelt, the grants-in-aid system has expanded, especially in the number and dollar amount of categorical grant programs.
Date: February 19, 2003
Creator: Canada, Ben
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Freedom of Information Act Amendments: 109th Congress (open access)

Freedom of Information Act Amendments: 109th Congress

This report discusses the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which was designed to enable any person — individual or corporate, regardless of citizenship — to request, without explanation or justification, presumptive access to existing, identifiable, unpublished, executive branch agency records on any topic.
Date: February 25, 2005
Creator: Relyea, Harold C.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Homosexuals and U.S. Military Policy: Current Issues (open access)

Homosexuals and U.S. Military Policy: Current Issues

This report discusses policy towards homosexuals in the U.S. military service. In 1993, new laws and regulations pertaining to homosexuals and U.S. military service came into effect reflecting a compromise in policy. This compromise, colloquially referred to as “don’t ask, don’t tell,” holds that the presence in the armed forces of persons who demonstrate a propensity or intent to engage in homosexual acts would create an unacceptable risk to the high standards of morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion which are the essence of military capability. Service members are not to be asked about nor allowed to discuss their homosexuality. This compromise notwithstanding, the issue has remained politically contentious.
Date: February 10, 2005
Creator: Burrelli, David F. & Dale, Charles V.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Federal Advertising Law: An Overview (open access)

Federal Advertising Law: An Overview

This report provides a brief overview of federal law with respect to five selected advertising issues: alcohol advertising, tobacco advertising, the Federal Trade Commission Act, advertising by mail, and advertising by telephone. There are numerous federal statutes regulating advertising that do not fit within any of these categories; as random examples, the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act requires disclosures in advertisements for prescription drugs ; the Truth in Lending Act governs the advertising of consumer credit ; and a federal criminal statute makes it illegal falsely to convey in an advertisement that a business is connected with a federal agency.
Date: February 9, 1998
Creator: Cohen, Henry
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Speechwriting in Perspective: A Brief Guide to Effective and Persuasive Communication (open access)

Speechwriting in Perspective: A Brief Guide to Effective and Persuasive Communication

“Rhetoric,” wrote Aristotle, “is the power of determining in a particular case what are the available means of persuasion.” This report reviews some effective means for the rhetoric of persuasive communication in speeches written by congressional staff for Senators and Representatives.
Date: February 25, 1998
Creator: Neale, Thomas H.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Going to Conference in the Senate (open access)

Going to Conference in the Senate

This report discusses the steps that the Senate must take, and one more step that it may take, as it arranges to send a bill to conference committee.
Date: February 1, 2000
Creator: Bach, Stanley
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
How Measures Are Brought to the House Floor: A Brief Introduction (open access)

How Measures Are Brought to the House Floor: A Brief Introduction

This report presents a brief description of the five methods used to bring proposed legislation to the House floor for consideration.
Date: February 5, 1997
Creator: Saturno, James V.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Grants Work in a Congressional Office (open access)

Grants Work in a Congressional Office

Members of Congress often get requests from constituents for information and help in obtaining funds for projects. Many state and local governments, nonprofit social service and community action organizations, private research groups, small businesses, and individuals approach congressional offices to find out about funding, both from the federal government and from the private sector. The success rate in obtaining federal assistance is not high, given the competition for federal funds. A grants staff’s effectiveness often depends on both an understanding of the grants process and on the relations it establishes with agency and other contacts. The following report does not constitute a blueprint for every office involved in grants and projects activity, nor does it present in-depth information about all aspects of staff activity in this area. The discussion is aimed at describing some basics about the grants process and some of the approaches and techniques used by congressional offices in dealing with this type of constituent service.
Date: February 14, 2002
Creator: Gerli, Merete F.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
House Rules Affecting Committees (open access)

House Rules Affecting Committees

House Rules, especially Rules X-XIII, govern the authority and operations of its committees and subcommittees. This report identifies and summarizes these and other rules and directives affecting committee powers, authority, activities, and operations.
Date: February 22, 1999
Creator: Bach, Stanley & Hardy-Vincent, Carol
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library
Unanimous Consent Agreements in the Senate (open access)

Unanimous Consent Agreements in the Senate

This report discusses the idea of "unanimous consent" in the Senate. Without its tradition of unanimous consent, the Senate would find it harder to process its complex workload.
Date: February 20, 2001
Creator: Oleszek, Walter J.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library