Via: The Advisory Board Company
It seems lately government at nearly all levels has shifted gears from being “by the People” to adopting a dictatorial partisan political flavor of the day that often seems to ignore the will of those being governed.
Examples are all around us. For instance, a small local one would be Mayor Cedric Glover’s dog park battle. But there’s a much larger poster child at our state level: Gov. Bobby Jindal’s refusal to allow the state to participate in next year’s Medicaid expansion portion of the 2010 Affordable Care Act (or Obamacare).
Citing fiscal reasons, our state is one of several led by Republican governors who plan to refuse to participate in one of the key pieces of the multiyear implementation of Obamacare — Medicaid expansion, which is set to go into effect Jan. 1. Obviously, this decision is coming from our elected state officials, but does it represent the will of “the People” of Louisiana?
According to a recent survey of residents in the South, that answer would be a resounding, “NO.”
Sixty-two percent of people in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina think states should participate in the Medicaid expansion portion of Obamacare — and in Louisiana alone, that number is 63 percent. The survey was conducted by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a nonpartisan think-tank that focuses on issues affecting African-Americans. To be fair, the survey while showing favor to the expansion of Medicaid, also showed an overall dislike for the law itself, with only about one-third of respondents viewing Obamacare favorably.
Still, the survey shows it’s time our elected leaders started listening to those who actually put them into office with votes rather than campaign contributions. At the very least, they could acknowledge that they hear us rather than the distant call of political chess moves yet to be made.
Jindal — along with our Republican U.S. congressmen who just recently voted for the third time to repeal the health care law — says the expansion would cost Louisiana more than $1.6 billion over 10 years. But as we have seen before (the income tax repeal effort earlier this year, for example), the numbers generated by the Jindal administration don’t always add up. Indeed, studies by the state Legislative Fiscal Office and the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals show the state could save money with Medicaid expansion.
Under the expansion, Americans who earn less than 133 percent of the poverty level (about $14,000 for an individual and $29,000 for a family of four) will be able to enroll in Medicaid. States will receive 100 percent federal funding for the first three years of the program, phasing to 90 percent after that.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates the expansion will add little to what states would have spent on Medicaid without health reform, while providing health coverage to 17 million more low-income adults and children. Another factor to consider, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the expansion is expected to reduce state and local government costs for uncompensated care and other services they provide to the uninsured. In the CBO’s estimate, this reduction in cost in most (if not all states) is expected to offset some costs (possibly all or even more than all) of the increase in state Medicaid costs.
In Louisiana, 42 percent of residents have health insurance through an employer, 20 percent are enrolled in Medicaid, 20 percent are uninsured, 4 percent have individual coverage and 13 percent are on Medicare, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care research group.
In about six months, this vital step in health care reform will go active, and Louisiana needs to be a part of it.
