Article 1: California Becomes First In Nation To Expand Medicaid To Undocumented Young Adults
Clay’s summary: Before all you federal “taxpayers” get upset- I am pretty sure anything the are offering to these folks is paid for by state only funds.. So its not exactly Medicaid. But it makes a great headline, amiright?
Key Excerpts from the Article:
Some lawmakers argued California should be spending health care dollars on its own citizens, rather than people who are not living in the state legally.
“We are going to be a magnet that is going to further attract people to a state of California that’s willing to write a blank check to anyone that wants to come here,” said Republican Senator Jeff Stone at a recent legislative hearing.
President Donald Trump also criticized California for offering health insurance to undocumented people.
“They don’t treat their people as well as they treat illegal immigrants,” the Republican president told reporters in the White House on Monday. “It’s very unfair to our citizens and we’re going to stop it, but we may need an election to stop it.”
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Article 2: Block Granting Medicaid is Still a Terrible Idea
Clay’s summary: Sort of related, sort of serious question: Is a salary sort of a micro-block grant? Like at the individual level?
Key Excerpts from the Article:
While the promise of increased flexibility can sound enticing, the reality is that so-called flexibility pits funding choices against one another and ultimately leads to cuts. Medicaid already has the flexibility it needs to respond to economic downturns or public health crises, and capping funding for the program makes these responses more difficult.
Block grants have not worked in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. What we know from 20 years of experience with TANF is that funding has not increased with inflation or in response to poverty and need. Moreover, states have used TANF funds to support alternative programs and have significantly decreased the aid going directly to families.
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Article 3: The inconvenient truths of Louisiana’s Medicaid expansion
Clay’s summary: All that “free” Federal funding still comes from taxpayers like you and me.
Key Excerpts from the Article:
In the wake of a wave of stories about the tens of thousands of ineligible individuals who received Medicaid benefits, supporters keep trying to defend Louisiana’s expansion of Medicaid to the able-bodied. But their defenses ignore several inconvenient truths.
First, money doesn’t grow on trees. Health Secretary Rebekah Gee recently claimed that Louisiana’s “Medicaid expansion comes at no additional cost to taxpayers.” Because she believes the federal government will pay all the cost of Medicaid expansion, she thinks Louisiana taxpayers are “off the hook” for the program’s spending. But anyone who had to mail a check to the Internal Revenue Service on April 15 would disagree. By definition, any new government spending imposes a cost to taxpayers, because Louisiana residents pay taxes to Washington just like everyone else.
And Louisiana has seen a ton of new government spending due to Medicaid expansion. In 2015, the Legislative Fiscal Office projected spending on expansion to total $1.2 billion-$1.4 billion per year. In the last fiscal year, Louisiana spent nearly $3.1 billion on expansion—or more than double the Fiscal Office’s original estimates.
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