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The rise in noncommunicable diseases and the quality of life concerns associated with their incidence and prevalence has brought issues of health promotion and prevention to the forefront of health policy. This article investigates the effects of two political institutions - welfare state regimes and federalism - on preventative policy initiatives related to nutrition and physical activity. Case studies of Germany and the United States are compared using recent laws, programs, and policies promoting healthy lifestyles. The results indicate that the different types of welfare state regimes do not have as much of an effect on policies regarding physical activity and nutrition, and that the type of federalism is dependent on the national context but does have a significant effect on policies; the political institution with more relative influence is found to be federalism. Ultimately, the relationship between welfare state regimes and types of federalism is complex and needs to be taken on a case-by-case basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What affects state-level public opinion on Medicaid? I leverage the passage of the ACA, which has given a more prominent role to states when it comes to Medicaid policies. I utilize multilevel regression and poststratification (MRP) - to analyze new state-level public opinion on Medicaid before (2005) and after (2012) the ACA was passed. The core question is (Kaiser Family Foundation survey): "I'm going to read you a list of federal government programs and for each one, please tell me how important you think this program is. Is it very important, somewhat important, not very important, or not at all important? What about Medicaid?" Results indicate Medicaid support diversified, with a larger range of views and an overall drop in importance rankings. Both years correlate with American Ideology Project data; conservative-leaning states tend to give less importance to Medicaid than liberal ones. The four states (IL, WV, FL, OK) that underwent the greatest drop in public opinion come from different sides of the Medicaid opinion and ideology spectrums and have different Medicaid expansion trajectories. A combination of public opinion, ideologies, and income inequalities play key roles in explaining these states' trajectories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]