Barbara Anthony Joins Pioneer Institute as Senior Fellow in Healthcare

Former undersecretary of consumer affairs will work to enhance healthcare transparency

Read coverage of this announcement by MassLive, State House News Service, and The Boston Globe.

Media inquiries: Micaela Dawson, 617-723-2277 ext. 203 or mdawson@pioneerinstitute.org

BOSTON – Pioneer Institute is pleased to announce the appointment of former Massachusetts Undersecretary of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation Barbara Anthony as a consultant and Senior Fellow in Healthcare. Anthony will gauge the status of compliance with new state laws that require consumer-directed transparency among healthcare providers and insurers.

“I look forward to partnering with Pioneer Institute to continue to advocate and offer suggestions for best practices for greater transparency in healthcare costs and prices for Massachusetts consumers and businesses,” Anthony said.  “Few services are more important than healthcare, yet we have no idea what they cost us before we obtain such services.  It’s time for us to all work together to strip away the veil of secrecy that harms consumers and the market.”

“Markets work best when there is information on cost and quality,” said Pioneer’s executive director Jim Stergios.  “I look forward to working with Barbara to make sure consumers and employers have the transparency they deserve and need in order to make informed decisions.”

While Anthony may not agree with Pioneer’s positions on certain state and federal healthcare issues, on the subject of pricing transparency and its benefits for all, she and the Institute share common ground and goals.

Anthony is currently a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Center for Business and Government where she is leading study groups, and researching and writing about Massachusetts healthcare cost containment efforts.  She serves on several non-profit boards and was also recently appointed to the Massachusetts Financial Literacy Trust Fund Board by State Treasurer Deborah Goldberg.

As undersecretary of the Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation from 2009 until earlier this year, Anthony oversaw five state agencies and numerous consumer issues.   Anthony was an outspoken advocate for healthcare price transparency and launched the continuing www.getthedealoncare.org campaign. While at Consumer Affairs, she helped keep health insurance rate increases down and helped implement the 2012 state Healthcare Cost Containment Law.

Previously, Anthony was executive director of Health Law Advocates, a Boston-based non-profit law firm dedicated to healthcare access, regional director of the Northeast Regional Office of the Federal Trade Commission, and chief of the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Public Protection Bureau. Anthony began her career as an antitrust trial attorney at the U.S. Justice Department.

Anthony is a graduate of Suffolk University Law School, where she serves as an adjunct professor of law.  She also holds a graduate degree in economics and a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Northeastern University.

About Barbara Anthony

Barbara Anthony is currently a Senior Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Center for Business and Government where she is leading study groups and researching and writing about Massachusetts healthcare cost containment efforts.  She served as Massachusetts Undersecretary of the Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation from 2009 to 2015 where she oversaw five state agencies: Banking, Insurance, Professional Licensure, Telecommunications and Cable, and the Division of Standards. Anthony, with a background in law and economics, is a well-known consumer advocate and a highly respected public interest lawyer and policy maker. Among her accomplishments, Anthony oversaw implementation of the state’s Data Security Law and regulations, kept health insurance rate increases under control, helped implement the state’s 2012 Health Care Cost Containment Law, oversaw efforts to reform the mortgage foreclosure process, initiated a financial literacy project, Project Credit Smarts, in several Massachusetts colleges, and spearheaded a campaign to empower Massachusetts healthcare consumers through price and quality transparency.

Previously, Anthony was Executive Director of Health Law Advocates, the Boston-based non-profit law firm dedicated to health care access; Regional Director of the Northeast Regional Office of the Federal Trade Commission; Chief of the Public Protection Bureau of the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office; and Vice President and Chief Compliance Officer for BayBanks, Inc. Anthony began her legal career as a Trial Attorney in the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C.  Anthony’s expertise focuses on privacy and data security, financial services, Internet fraud, and health care.

She is a graduate of Suffolk University Law School, where she currently serves as an Adjunct Professor of Law. She holds a graduate degree in economics and a bachelor of science in business administration from Northeastern University.  She serves on the boards of the Cambridge Health Alliance Foundation, Cambridge Community Cable Television, the state Treasurer’s Financial Literacy Trust Fund Board and the Advisory Board of the Rappaport Center for Law and Public Policy at Boston College Law School.

She regularly appears as a media commentator on consumer protection and business regulation issues.

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Pioneer Institute is an independent, non-partisan, privately funded research organization that seeks to improve the quality of life in Massachusetts through civic discourse and intellectually rigorous, data-driven public policy solutions based on free market principles, individual liberty and responsibility, and the ideal of effective, limited and accountable government.