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Southern governors secede from Medicaid

TheDemSocialist

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House Republicans are lining up to repeal the
Affordable Care Act
on Wednesday, but GOP governors in the South have a real plan to gut the law.
Govs. Rick Perry in Texas and Rick Scott in Florida have both said they won’t expand Medicaid to more of the working poor in their states — rejecting a central part of the law designed to cover 15 million more Americans.

The governors can do it because the Supreme Court ruled last month that states can opt out of the expansion without paying a penalty.

Unlike the symbolic votes in the House this week, the governors’ tough talk has real-world consequences: Texas and Florida are among five hell-no states, meaning 3 million of the potential Medicaid beneficiaries — or about 1 in 5 nationwide — won’t get coverage through President Barack Obama’s health care law, according to a POLITICO analysis of data compiled by the Urban Institute. The governors of Mississippi, Louisiana and South Carolina also have said Washington can keep its Medicaid money and the new requirements that come with it.

“The bottom line here is that Medicaid is a failed program,” Perry said in a Monday appearance on Fox News. “To expand this program is not unlike adding a thousand people to the Titanic.”


Read more: Southern governors secede from Medicaid - Jonathan Allen and Kathryn Smith - POLITICO.com

[FONT=Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]Yea these guys are really for the "ordinary guy" really extending their helping hand...

Thoughts?
Comments?
Response?
[/FONT]​
 
'Bout time....
 
longlive the medical confederaciah
 
Its only going to hurt their hospitals and other medical care providers. If you are uninsured and show up at a hospital with something like cancer, that hospital will typically have a department whose sole responsibility is to see if you qualify for medicaid, and if so, to get you enrolled. The reason being of course is that they want to be reimbursed for the heath care they provide you. Obamacare, like Romneycare, eliminates the provisions of medicaid that reimbursed providers for uninsured patients. Instead, both programs extended the eligibility for medicaid to include more of the working poor. By refusing to accept the medicaid expansion - that is paid for by the federal government, those states that do so will only hurt their own hospitals.
 
nothing to see here until they start playing This song



if this starts playing everywhere it might be bad news bears!!!!!!!
 
Empty threat, I can guarantee it.
 
Its only going to hurt their hospitals and other medical care providers. If you are uninsured and show up at a hospital with something like cancer, that hospital will typically have a department whose sole responsibility is to see if you qualify for medicaid, and if so, to get you enrolled. The reason being of course is that they want to be reimbursed for the heath care they provide you. Obamacare, like Romneycare, eliminates the provisions of medicaid that reimbursed providers for uninsured patients. Instead, both programs extended the eligibility for medicaid to include more of the working poor. By refusing to accept the medicaid expansion - that is paid for by the federal government, those states that do so will only hurt their own hospitals.

It goes further than that. By not expanding Medicaid, all these Southern states are doing is pushing more poor voters towards Obama regardless of their political lean. If these Republican governors aren't offering an alternative or doing things to improve their state's economy where else are these people to turn to meet their health care needs? Ultimately, all turning down the Medicaid expansion will do is push more people exactly where they don't want them to go - towards the one political party that IS willing to help them meet their health care needs if not now then in the immediate future.

Of course, this feeds right into the "all poor people want are handouts" argument, but notice that I did include the state's role in improving their economy (re: "job creation") to lift the burdon of entitlement expectations. Republicans are only shooting themselves in the foot by not accepting the Medicaid expansion, and they'll only have themselves to blame for it.
 
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Its only going to hurt their hospitals and other medical care providers. If you are uninsured and show up at a hospital with something like cancer, that hospital will typically have a department whose sole responsibility is to see if you qualify for medicaid, and if so, to get you enrolled. The reason being of course is that they want to be reimbursed for the heath care they provide you. Obamacare, like Romneycare, eliminates the provisions of medicaid that reimbursed providers for uninsured patients. Instead, both programs extended the eligibility for medicaid to include more of the working poor. By refusing to accept the medicaid expansion - that is paid for by the federal government, those states that do so will only hurt their own hospitals.

Accepting the expanded provisions of the program with add future liabilities to the state, as the feds gradually stop paying the full cost of the program.
Besides the fact that adding more people to Medicaid, may not be the best idea when the program has issues with doctors dropping acceptance, because it doesn't pay enough.
 
The only way the states will see an increase in state spending in these programs is if they continue to keep wages depressed in their states so there is a big working poor category. Right now states work against the economic improvement of many of it's citizens by using 'low wage state' come-ons fighting other states for the same biscuit. The shameless whoring to draw jobs away from other states means first the wages have to be kept low and the middle class must make up the revenue loss because of all the giveaways to incoming business. But overall it doesn't help the country. (iffy if it even helps the state)

So I see the expansion of Medicaid as the carrot to end the states ill-thought though race to stay at the bottom when it comes to the standard of living many of it's lower income workers have. This might help encourage state governments to float all boats, not just the ones who eat 500 dollar rubber chicken...
 
'Bout time....

Speak for your own state.

I can't speak for Texas, but Florida could use that coverage.

The cities may be doing okay. But the rural areas could use that coverage of the poor.

During the recession, one of the areas that kept Florida's economy going was agriculture. But farm workers tend to be poor, especially since it's just seasonal work. And workers have to compete for low wages, which farm owners need because of the volatility of fuel prices for the diesel that tractors and equipment run on.

Also these are jobs that are necessary - look at the losses farms in Alabama are suffering because they can't get farm workers, which are generally immigrants.

And because farm work tends to be physical, they need health coverage more than office workers who get diabetes because the get fat eating at their desk and sitting on their ass all day.

So this is actually really really bad for Florida.
 
Assuming they actually go through with it, it should be a great boon for them....

These people will end up getting cared for.... IN OTHER STATES. That means these people will likely be LEAVING Texas, Florida, etc.... on a permanent basis, which I'm sure will also likely reduce those state's burden for OTHER social welfare programs.
 
Assuming they actually go through with it, it should be a great boon for them....

These people will end up getting cared for.... IN OTHER STATES. That means these people will likely be LEAVING Texas, Florida, etc.... on a permanent basis, which I'm sure will also likely reduce those state's burden for OTHER social welfare programs.

But presumably a lot of these people wouldn't be able afford insurance anyway? , government or otherwise.
 
But presumably a lot of these people wouldn't be able afford insurance anyway? , government or otherwise.

True, so what they'll do is to relocate to a neighboring state where they can still get Medicaid coverage. Let's see if I can explain it a little better this way....

Fred loses his job and goes on state aid (in Texas). Suddenly he gets sick, but since he doesn't have a job, he doesn't have health insurance. He goes to the state, but they tell him that they're not accepting any new Medicaid patients. Fred and his wife have to leave Texas and move to Arkansas where he CAN get Medicaid. Not only doesn't Texas end up paying for the Medicaid bill, but once Fred and his wife leave Texas they don't pay for his welfare either.
 
No Tigger, he just keeps using the ER as many of the uninsured currently do. A lot more keeps folks in a state, family for one, than medicaid. Someone is paying for his healthcare one way or another. Don't judge other's willingness to cut and run by your own willingness to flee this country...
 
True, so what they'll do is to relocate to a neighboring state where they can still get Medicaid coverage. Let's see if I can explain it a little better this way....

Fred loses his job and goes on state aid (in Texas). Suddenly he gets sick, but since he doesn't have a job, he doesn't have health insurance. He goes to the state, but they tell him that they're not accepting any new Medicaid patients. Fred and his wife have to leave Texas and move to Arkansas where he CAN get Medicaid. Not only doesn't Texas end up paying for the Medicaid bill, but once Fred and his wife leave Texas they don't pay for his welfare either.

Texas will also have one less worker. That means one less person paying sales tax to the local and state government for the few goods and services he does pay for. Which means less tax revenue to local and possibly state goverents.

It also means one less consumer to the small businesses who cater to him, such as grocery stores, clothing vendors and the like. That puts a burden on small business owners who definitely must pay various local, state, and federal taxes to operate.

That means small businesses will have a more difficult time operating and some will close down. In which case they will be forced to flee the state. Which means even fewer tax revenues for local, state, and federal governments.

And Texas isn't a state that can go without tax revenue. What do you think pays for the local police, state troopers, and federal agents trying to deal with gangs and Mexican cartels operating across the border?

Without those enforcement agencies holding the cartels in check - and the tax revenues needed to give them a paycheck - Texas would quickly be a failed state itself.

Or require military assistance itself, and thus ask the federal government for welfare and support.
 
No Tigger, he just keeps using the ER as many of the uninsured currently do. A lot more keeps folks in a state, family for one, than medicaid. Someone is paying for his healthcare one way or another. Don't judge other's willingness to cut and run by your own willingness to flee this country...

What it will end up doing is keeping a lot of working poor people from getting health care -- the kind that ER's don't provide -- and it will cost in-state hospitals billions of dollars in uncompensated ER care that would have been picked up by Medicare. I can only imagine that a lot of these governors will change their tunes once the health care lobby gears up.
 
Elected leaders opting for personal partisan political posturings rather than look out for the people ...... perhaps it is the end times?
 
If only more people, and especially the federal government, actually started taking this approach more on MULTIPLE issues.

That is true - though it depends on the issue.
 
I don't see how the benefit outweighs the detriment of maintaining programs that don't work efficiently. Government-funded medical programs (Medicaid/Medicare/SCHIP) all pay out less than the actual cost of service, thereby driving up the prices everybody else is expected to pay. So the capable but un-insured and the insured (via their carrier) pay more.

And those programs (and the ACA) do NOTHING to address the actually cost of health care.

So we expand and add more people to government healthcare and then what? See prices continue to rise as costs continue to rise and even more people utilize a system that underpays for service? Makes a **** load of sense...

I see no reason states should be mandated to take part in any system of entitlement that results in a heavier burden on the rest of the system, especially when their hands are tied to implement policies that would drive down health costs because the fed won't do anything on the national level other than keep pushing for an even more distorted cost-to-payout ratio.
 
No Tigger, he just keeps using the ER as many of the uninsured currently do. A lot more keeps folks in a state, family for one, than medicaid. Someone is paying for his healthcare one way or another.

this. the really poor don't just get in the car and relocate unless they have family somewhere else. the uninsured will keep using the emergency room, and we'll continue to pay for-profit prices for it through our premiums.
 
I don't see how the benefit outweighs the detriment of maintaining programs that don't work efficiently. Government-funded medical programs (Medicaid/Medicare/SCHIP) all pay out less than the actual cost of service, thereby driving up the prices everybody else is expected to pay. So the capable but un-insured and the insured (via their carrier) pay more.

And those programs (and the ACA) do NOTHING to address the actually cost of health care.

So we expand and add more people to government healthcare and then what? See prices continue to rise as costs continue to rise and even more people utilize a system that underpays for service? Makes a **** load of sense...

I see no reason states should be mandated to take part in any system of entitlement that results in a heavier burden on the rest of the system, especially when their hands are tied to implement policies that would drive down health costs because the fed won't do anything on the national level other than keep pushing for an even more distorted cost-to-payout ratio.

But the reason why we're continuing with this broken healthcare system is because of constant objection to a single-payer universal system.
 
But the reason why we're continuing with this broken healthcare system is because of constant objection to a single-payer universal system.

Single payer isn't an answer to medical costs either, Sam. People are already strained...higher taxes to cover a program that doesn't pay out at the actual cost of care provided is still a broken system.
 
Single payer isn't an answer to medical costs either, Sam. People are already strained...higher taxes to cover a program that doesn't pay out at the actual cost of care provided is still a broken system.

What do you mean by "actual cost of care"? When doctors refuse to take Medicare patients it generally isn't because they would lose money -- it's because they wouldn't be making as much money as they WANT to make. Doctors in the US earn far more than doctors in any other country, e.g. more than double what a doctor in France makes. Of course in nationalized systems doctors also pay far less for school and insurance, but those are things that can be addressed in a comprehensive national health care system.
 
Its only going to hurt their hospitals and other medical care providers. If you are uninsured and show up at a hospital with something like cancer, that hospital will typically have a department whose sole responsibility is to see if you qualify for medicaid, and if so, to get you enrolled. The reason being of course is that they want to be reimbursed for the heath care they provide you. Obamacare, like Romneycare, eliminates the provisions of medicaid that reimbursed providers for uninsured patients. Instead, both programs extended the eligibility for medicaid to include more of the working poor. By refusing to accept the medicaid expansion - that is paid for by the federal government, those states that do so will only hurt their own hospitals.

What makes you think they will get treated?
 
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