Overwhelming Medicaid enrollment crippling state budgets

Discussion in 'Politics' started by Clubber Lang, Jul 20, 2015.

  1. You're an idiot.
    Didnt read any of your drivel after "All the studies I have seen". All you left wing nuts read the same propaganda and lap it up like a puppy.

    Obamacare has been one giant lie after another. This is no different.
     
    #21     Jul 20, 2015
    der_kommissar likes this.
  2. piezoe

    piezoe

    The Federal government is committed to covering 100% of the cost of expansion phasing down to 90% by 2020. There is NO cost (ZERO) to the State for expansion until 2016 or 2017, at which point the net cost, after expansion related revenues are added in, will be minimal. The Federal contribution is calculated by the federal government as percentage -- so the greater than anticipated enrollment will also result in a bump up of the Federal contribution and a bump up of expansion related revenues to the States..

    All of the professionally done cost studies by economists have concluded that the additional revenues that will accrue because of expansion will cover, or even exceed according to some studies, the small amount the States will eventually have to kick in. (This is where those percentage Federal Contribution Figures come from and they can be adjusted, if need be.) This is going to cost all of us a lot of money, but it isn't going to cost the States hardly anything. And even if those projections turn out to be a little off the mark the ratio of benefit to cost, from a State Budget point of view is through the roof!

    The cost to us federal tax payers will go up because of the much greater demand than anticipated. However that cost is there whether our State expanded or not. Thus those of us who live in States that did not expand get cheated to an even greater extent because of the greater than anticipated demand. Not one red cent is being saved by the Sates that do not expand, rather they are denying thousands access to care and wrecking the health of their citizens, all for purely partisan political reasons. This is political malpractice of the highest order!

    The reality is that this law is in place, whether we like it our not. I personally think it is a badly flawed law for reasons I have stated many times. Essentially it retains all of the worst features of U.S. style medical care,i.e., it leaves the Cartel virtually untouched -- and when you have a cartel, and customers don't have the option of walking, you can expect prices to go through the roof. But the one good thing that the ACA did do was to expand access to millions! We should all be very happy about this one aspect of the ACA.
     
    #22     Jul 21, 2015
  3. piezoe

    piezoe

    Are you suggesting that being "hooked" on access to routine medical care and being "hooked" on heroin is an apt comparison???
     
    #23     Jul 21, 2015
  4. jem

    jem

    Piezoe

    1. could you tell me why we needed obamacare to swell the medicaid rolls.
    how many of these new sign ups lost insurance or could no longer afford it?

    2. how is busting up already tenuous state budgets a good thing?

    3. You have just posted substantially the same govt propaganda multiple times and are completely non responsive to the issue brought up in these articles. first you blamed republican governors but now your realize its states like CA and Oregon facing the problems we all anticipated.


    the "small amounts" the states will kick have turned into larger amounts because many more people signed up.
    do you get that yet?

    90 percent of x is turning out to be 90 percent of 2x.

    4. If Obama really wanted to something besides screwing us over... instead of having tax payers pay 4 to 5 grand more a year to private companies and at the same time grow medicaid rolls... he should have just covered a few more americans with single payer.
     
    #24     Jul 21, 2015
  5. loyek590

    loyek590

    repeal obamacare, expand medicaid, nobody has a problem paying for the poor's healthcare. But what business is it for the government to be involved in my healthcare?
     
    #25     Jul 21, 2015
  6. loyek590

    loyek590

    single payer sounds good but I will never go for it. Basically, you are talking about medicare for all. Look at all the fraud we have now in medicare, and that is just for 65+. Can you imagine what it would look like if 300 million were covered? No, not for me. I'll pay for the poor, and I'll pay for myself.

    I could however go for a government catastrophic policy. That would be where we the people decide to pay for any unfortunate individual whose medical bills exceeds 10% of his income.
     
    #26     Jul 21, 2015
  7. Piezoe is one large bundle of passive-aggressive douchebaggery...He "plays nice" with his verbose, meandering rebuttals and then "snaps" in an instant...Always good for a laugh.
     
    #27     Jul 21, 2015
    Clubber Lang likes this.
  8. piezoe

    piezoe

    The regular font is from Jem's post, the italics are my responses.

    Piezoe,

    1. could you tell me why we needed obamacare to swell the medicaid rolls.
    how many of these new sign ups lost insurance or could no longer afford it?

    As you have discovered, the need for medicaid was far higher than was realized. This is a measure of how much we underestimated the fraction of the population without access to routine care. It's a national disgrace! Virtually none of these low income folks had insurance before the ACA. After the ACA they don't qualify for premium supplement because they make too little, not too much. The formula used to determine how much help with insurance one could qualify for was predicated on these low income folks being covered by expansion of medicaid. This is what the Republican Governors threw a monkey wrench into. The formula!!! There is a big misconception that before the ACA one could qualify for medicaid if their income was below a set level. This is only one of the requirements! There are many low income people who did not qualify, depending on the State they lived in. Rules for medicaid vary from State to State to State, just like the rules for who gets executed.

    2. how is busting up already tenuous state budgets a good thing?
    expansion, according to projections will have only a negligible affect on State budgets.

    Many States had serious problems funding their share of Medicaid prior to the ACA. The ACA medicaid expansion does not make these problems any worse. If the projections are reasonably close to reality, the number who sign up for medicaid won't affect State contributions to the expanded portion of medicaid. Doubling Nil is still Nil. Cost projections take into account the increases in State revenue resulting from expansion. That is where the eventual (by 2020) 10% figure for the State contributions comes from. It is the approximate amount of their increased revenue projected to result from expansion. The greater the numbers that qualify in each State, the greater the revenue increases to be realized in that State.

    3. You have just posted substantially the same govt propaganda multiple times and are completely non responsive to the issue brought up in these articles.
    first you blamed republican governors but now your realize its states like CA and Oregon facing the problems we all anticipated.

    I am unresponsive because all of these articles are assuming something will happen that has not happened. Right now, there is zero cost to the states for expanding medicaid, no matter how many qualify. I know nothing of Oregon other than they had their own health plan, and how it was to interface with the ACA I do not know. CA has serious budget problems. Expansion of medicaid there will not affect these problems at all for the moment, because the federal government is bearing 100% of the cost of expansion. It may have a minimal effect later depending on how accurate the projections prove to be The problem for all States, as it is for all citizens, is ridiculously high medical costs, and before the ACA, far too many without ready access to routine care.

    the "small amounts" the states will kick have turned into larger amounts because many more people signed up.
    do you get that yet?

    Based on the projections you are incorrect. The net cost to States, after revenue is accounted for, is projected to be near zero regardless of how many sign up. Revenue grows in proportion to enrollment. There has been zero increase in cost so far. Costs are covered by the federal government.

    90 percent of x is turning out to be 90 percent of 2x.

    It is not 90% as far as the States are concerned. Now through 2017 it is zero %. It will grow slowly to 10% by 2020.

    4. If Obama really wanted to something besides screwing us over... instead of having tax payers pay 4 to 5 grand more a year to private companies and at the same time grow medicaid rolls... he should have just covered a few more americans with single payer.

    I'm not going to defend the ACA as it was finally passed. As you know, I don't like it. I'm addressing the reality of what exists, not what might have been or could have been.

    The bottom line is that these Republican Governors who have blocked medicaid expansion in their respective States are derelict in their duties. For purely partisan political reasons that can not, at this point anyway, be justified with facts and figures, other than the self-serving partial truths they have used to mislead the public, they have denied thousands in each of their States access to routine care, and caused all of their constituents to be cheated. The greater the enrollment would have been had medicaid been expanded, the more they have cheated their constituents. In the states that did not expand, taxes are being paid to subsidize expansion in other states. Although there is no statutory law to prosecute these governors for their outrageous behavior, they are nevertheless all criminals in my mind.


    Trying to solve the conceptually simple but politically nearly impossible to solve problem of unsustainable medical costs in the U.S. is a problem apart from the absolute necessity of expanding medicaid.

    This much I know. Just as we couldn't hope to solve an air pollution problem by not breathing, we can't solve the problem of medical costs being 100%, or more, too high by not not availing ourselves, or preventing others from availing themselves, of medical care. Those whose solution to high cost is just to deny access to all but those who can afford to pay are making the problem worse. They are not helping.
     
    Last edited: Jul 21, 2015
    #28     Jul 21, 2015
  9. loyek590

    loyek590

    ha ha, the socialists little dirty secret. And that is what happens if you don't obey. Listen to this guy. Governors are given a choice. But if they don't choose right they should be tried as criminals.

    The government is going to give you some money if you do it our way. If you don't do it our way, not only will you not get the money, but piezoe will call you a criminal.

    I thought you had to break a law to be a criminal. What law did they break?
     
    #29     Jul 21, 2015
  10. jem

    jem

    1. thanks for the info... but you did not address part of my point. the main part. before asking the question... I read on multiple sites... some of the recent new medicaid enrollees enrolled because they lost their health insurance or could no longer afford it. you are not denying that obamacare did that to some people are you? I had hoped you had those numbers. Was it a trivial amount or a large amount of people.

    2. you seem to be denying the point of the revised projections. Based on the fact more people have signed up, the revenue short fall is projected to grow substantially. To have been a useful answer you should have actually addressed the new situation rather than fall back on Gruber / Obama sales pitches.

    3. we know until 2017 the feds are suppose to cover it. You know that, we know that, that is how obama pitched it... take the heroin now... pay for some of it later. This whole argument is about 2017 being to more difficult than projected because more people enrolled.

    Why do you keep talking about now... that is completely irrelevant to the issue we were addressing.

    thank you for the response.
     
    #30     Jul 21, 2015