In this short book R.W. Murphy makes the argument that the US healthcare delivery system is irreparably broken as the result of a perfectly inelastic demand curve for healthcare goods and services. In essence he indicates that Americans will buy the same number of units regardless of price and that is destroying the system. He points to all the retail level cost control initiatives to date as failing to address wholesale pricing pressures. His premise is that underlying wholesale cost increases have hardly been affected at all. Any cost reductions at the retail level resulting from tough utilization management have been no more than temporary stair step efforts that get quickly absorbed. He offers both historical perspective and going-forward options for structural change. He refers to the need to make the demand curve more price responsive as an American Healthcare Imperative because the inevitable alternative is serious damage to American society in its absence. He indicates that failing to act is no longer an option. R.W. Murphy has been involved in healthcare cost control since 1980. He started his career as a home office underwriter for a major US healthcare insurance company. In 1990 he became a consultant for an international firm and in 1995 formed his owned consulting company. He has been involved in virtually every cost control initiative in the last forty years - and by his own admission has the scars to prove it. The book has been made deliberately short. It can be read in less than an hour. The author indicates that his intent has been to make Americans think about the necessity for structural change - not give them an actual road map for it. As such he remains relatively nonpartisan regarding the options. He also is clear that he has spent less time in doing statistical research then using his professional experience to show relationships. He tells the reader to not be caught up in absolute numbers but to instead examine the historical and projected trends.The Introduction has been written under an alias by a professional healthcare administrator in West Palm Beach Florida. By remaining anonymous he offers candid opinions with which peer administrators might not agree. His comments come from perspective gained via vast experience on the provider side of the industry. In addition his politics are significantly right of the author s. As such his views provide germane counterpoint.As more a red-flag then a how-to book at its price point it should be read by every person who believes that healthcare policy will be an important differentiating factor in the 2020 US election.

Recruit heroes. Build an empire. Defend it with your life. Talon and the Black Hats are notorious troublemakers in the online world of Haven. With a history of brash rebellion and legendary deeds what are champions to do next? Founding a headquarters is a good start but the Black Hats aren t the only empire builders in the land. As crusaders mobilize an army assassins struggle for independence and dissidents make waves in Stronghold Haven s tentative peace is threatened. The gears of war are churning and Talon refuses to be crushed in the teeth. Enlisting the help of an old friend Talon hatches an ingenious scheme to wrangle the embattled citizens of Haven to his cause. Except there s another plot shaping the virtual world one meticulously devised by a ghost in the machine. The true fight it turns out started a long time ago and the real battle may be one against legends.

Hackers trolls and stalkers all represent the ugly side of the Internet. Children using social media the Internet and emails are likely to encounter them at some time. This book provides practical ways to deal with cyberbullying and threats from the digital world. Learn about fake news and passwords to ensure that all your online activity is safe and enjoyable. This series provides children with strategies for responding to situations in which they feel unsafe worried or upset. Recognizing when someone else needs a helping hand and knowing what to do in an emergency are vital skills that children can learn as they grow into citizens of the future.

Based on Chinese archival documents interviews and more than twenty years of research on the subject Zhihua Shen and Yafeng Xia offer a comprehensive look at the Sino-Soviet alliance between the end of the World War II and 1959 when the alliance was left in disarray as a result of foreign and domestic policies. This book is a reevaluation of the history of this alliance and is the first book published in English to examine it from a Chinese perspective.

In Online Education: Global Questions Local Answers 24 college educators focus on the most important questions to be addressed by all scholar-teachers and administrators committed to developing high-quality online education programs. We describe these questions as global because they transcend the particular situations of individual institutions. They are questions that everyone involved in online education needs to address: What are the issues to consider when first developing and then sustaining an online education program? How do we create interactive pedagogically sound online courses and classroom communities? How should we monitor and assess the quality of online courses and programs? And how should recent developments and innovations in online education cause us to reexamine our roles and responsibilities as educators in technical communication?While these global questions affect all of us in one way or another they demand different local answers such as those presented by the contributors to this text. Readers will need to consider which of these local answers might apply to their own situations and how these answers might need to be adapted to reflect the particular needs of their own institutions.