Infosheet: Key Provisions in the House-passed Reconciliation Bill—H.R. 1, the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill Act’
An infosheet provides analysis of key health, philanthropy, and nonprofit provisions in H.R. 1, the budget reconciliation bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on May 22, 2025. Changes include an estimated $715 billion reduction in federal Medicaid spending including work requirements, new eligibility requirements to the Affordable Care Act that will reduce access to the ACA’s Advanced Premium Tax Credits, $300 billion in reductions to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, an excise tax on foundations, and new authority for the Secretary of the Treasury to remove the tax-exempt status of nonprofits the administration deems as “terrorist support organizations.”
From Recovery to Resilience: Investing in Collaborative Infrastructure for Health and Equity
After the 2018 Camp Fire – the most destructive and deadly wildfire in California’s history – the California Accountable Communities for Health Initiative (CACHI) understood that the community needed more than programming to recover. In response, the region’s Accountable Community for Health (ACH) was created – a community-rooted, cross-sector collaborative that invests in local leadership to shift systems, influence policy, and address both long-standing inequities and urgent crises.
Broken Triangle: A Framework for Reparative Philanthropic Relationships
Traditional philanthropic practices have often created imbalanced power dynamics and barriers for Black-led, Black-serving organizations. When the REACH Healthcare Foundation performed a portfolio review in 2018 that revealed this same exclusion within the foundation’s grantmaking investments, REACH committed to reshaping their funding approach, which aims to repair previously neglected —and in some cases, damaged —relationships.
Looking Around the Corner: (Re) Imagining Power for a Healthy and Just California
A report prepared by the USC Equity Research Institute for The California Endowment summarizes a forward-looking project to envision what we can collectively achieve if we invest in movements.
Philanthropic Investment in People Power
The California Endowment is spearheading renewed interest in an approach that supports communities to be the architects of their own equity efforts. This article in the Stanford Social Innovation Review (Winter 2023) examines the evidence generated by a decade-long effort that grew up around The California Endowment’s Building Healthy Communities initiative and provides lessons to other philanthropies incorporating a power-building strategy.
For the Community, By the Community: How Philanthropy Can Support Culturally-Led Mental Health Program
Mindful philanthropy recently released new guidance on how funders can support culturally-led mental health programs that are developed by and for communities of color.
Reforming ERISA to Help States Control Health Care Costs
The federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) preempts many state laws relating to employer-sponsored health insurance and thereby dilutes states’ ability to enact cost-control reforms. This Issue Brief from The Commonwealth Fund assesses past efforts and current opportunities for federal legislation on ERISA preemption to enable state cost-control reforms.
Announcing GIH’s 2023 Policy Priorities: Using Our Voice to Make Systemic Changes
When we launched our strategic plan, we noted that to achieve our vision of better health for all through better philanthropy we would need to use our voice to take a more active role to influence advocacy, policy, and funding in targeted areas that will advance health and make a lasting, measurable impact. Our current health “system” is not designed to promote health and wellness, but to provide care once a person is sick, and it is built on a foundation of inequity based on health coverage, or a lack thereof.
Let’s Close the Gap on Mental Health for Good in 2023
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, a mental health crisis was growing in America, with 1 in 10 adults reporting symptoms of anxiety or depression. Today, that number is 3 in 10. The recently launched 988 hotline—the mental health equivalent and alternative to 911—is a monumental step forward in changing how we acknowledge and respond to mental health needs nationally. It finally puts mental health on equal ground with physical health—a recognition long overdue—but it is only a first step in addressing the multitude of behavioral health needs.