News - June 2005

In late May each year the University of Michigan Law School welcomes a new class of summer starters. As in the past, this year's group of 90 matriculants represents a fascinating array of interests and experiences, guaranteeing that the Law School remains a lively place.

Matt Muspratt, Antonia Eliason, and Dr. Larry Perlman, three members of the class, agreed to share a little about their backgrounds and goals, and in doing so provide a sampling of the diversity represented in this year's group.

"I'm turning 30 this summer, and at this 'advanced age' I have thought a lot about how a law degree can fit into my background in African development and environmental issues," says Muspratt. After spending time as a Peace Corps volunteer, development worker, and master's student, he says he's "encountered all kinds of poverty, health, and governance issues throughout West and Southern Africa." He's decided that a law degree will prepare him to work more deeply and effectively in these fields. Muspratt sees Michigan's international programs and "faculty and staff's enthusiasm for helping students pursue less-traveled interests" as a significant advantage.

"I chose the Law School because of its strong international law program as well as the collegiate atmosphere," Eliason says. She presented her paper, "Russia and the Near Abroad: The Politics of Energy," for a panel at the Association for the Study of Nationalities 2005 World Convention at Columbia University in April. She says, "The paper was inspired by the internship I held at the Department of Commerce's Office of Energy while I worked on my M.A. in European and Eurasian studies."

Dr. Larry Perlman has practiced internal medicine in suburban Detroit for the past three years. He says, "While medicine was immensely rewarding, I was drawn to the type of analytical reasoning intrinsic to the study of law. Starting in the summer has been great. Just a few weeks into it and we're not only learning to think like lawyers, but aided by the small size of our group, we're doing it together, more as a team than a group of unrelated individuals."

This year's summer start class also includes a hula dancer; a former legal assistant in a Korean law firm; two military veterans; a student who worked in Brazil for the prevention of child abuse; a Fulbright scholar who studied in Japan; and a woman who tutored in Ecuador and taught dance classes in an Ecuadorean women's prison to name just a few of the interesting backgrounds represented by class members. Assistant Dean for Admissions Sarah Zearfoss says, "We talk about how important diversity is in the classroom for the total learning experience, and we see it unfold as each new class brings such different life experiences and goals with them."

While still in law school at Harvard, University of Michigan Law School Professor Jill Horwitz wrote her third-year paper on hospital ownership. Ten years later her interest in healthcare hasn't wavered. Recently, Professor Horwitz shared some of her research findings with the U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means. Her testimony focused on evidence that shows large, systematic, and long-standing differences between for-profit and nonprofit hospitals. (The complete report can be found at waysandmeans.house.gov/hearings.asp?fformmode=view&id=2717.)

Horwitz' research found that "for-profit hospitals are more likely than their nonprofit counterparts to offer the most profitable services, and less likely than either nonprofits or government hospitals to offer services that are unprofitable yet valuable, even essential." In her testimony, she used the example of psychiatric emergency services versus open heart surgery. Psychiatric emergency services are considered "extremely unprofitable" while open heart surgery is "so profitable that it is often referred to as a hospital's 'revenue center.'" According to her research, "for-profit hospitals were 7 percent less likely than nonprofits and 15 percent less likely than government hospitals to offer psychiatric emergency services." In contrast, Horwitz found that for-profit hospitals were 7 percent more likely to offer open heart surgery services and 13 percent more likely than government hospitals to provide these services.

Horwitz believes that her findings, that show that nonprofit hospitals are more willing than for-profit hospitals to offer "unprofitable services" such as psychiatric emergency care, AIDS treatment, alcohol and drug treatment, emergency rooms, trauma services, and obstetric care, are important in shifting lawmakers' perceptions about what makes nonprofit hospitals important to the public and worthy of the nonprofit hospital tax exemption.

"Among policy makers who have considered the nonprofit hospital tax exemption, there has been what looks like an almost single-minded focus on the differences in charity care provision," Horwitz says. "While charity care is important, I hope that my research demonstrates additional ways that nonprofits serve the public good and differ from for-profit hospitals."