Lawmakers in Georgia and Kansas have just passed bills that will effectively prevent Medicaid from expanding in those states, according to Talking Points Memo. And yet, both states saw an increase in Medicaid enrollments this year. The states, along with several others that declined the expansion, will enjoy the worst parts of Medicaid: increased costs from new enrollees who were already eligible for Medicaid and thousands of uninsured residents still in the coverage gap.
The new bills would require any Medicaid expansion to be explicitly approved by the state's (likely) Republican legislature. So even if Democrats win the governor's race this year, they won't be able to approve the expansion. That means roughly 400,000 Georgians and 77,000 Kansans will remain without Medicaid coverage for the foreseeable future. But as Bill Toland at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writes, the overall increase in Medicaid enrollment in states that opted out means that states like Kansas and Georgia will still end up insuring more people, but without 100 percent federal support.
"It’s a positive for health overhaul advocates," Toland writes. "But for those who were against 'Obamacare' to begin with, it’s a case study in unintended consequences since new enrollees will mean new expenses for the state."
what is it that makes them think in an election year they can crap on voters with impunity? are the voters in those states so concentrated on that they don't question why they are being singled out for republican governors to deny Pres. well in their confused minds they are not denying Pres. they are denying their constituents namely "YOU".
For years Obamacare critics have been worried about the "woodwork effect" — the theory that the publicity surrounding the Affordable Care Act (and the individual mandate) would drive people who were already eligible for Medicaid into the program.
Those people would come out of the woodwork, costing states money — on average, the federal government foots the bill for just 60 percent of non-expansion Medicaid enrollees. "The state's complaint is, 'We said we would cover these people and now we're going to have to actually cover them and pay for them,'" Stan Dorn, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute, told The Huffington Post in 2012.
that sounds awfully indifferent, "we said we would cover these people" with what the same thing they are trying to get away from the things that ACA corrects the substandard policies that can drop you, deny you or ignore you, that's not insurance that's pot luck and republicans just spit in the pot.
all about the Benjamin's they are telling them their lives are not worth the additional money to handle them, Dems need to run on these apathetic gestures by the republicans and assure them the security of affordable and dependable health care whether it's from your old doctor or a new one you are covered be thankful you no longer have to be subjected to republican health care, ER'S vouchers.
