Everyone Needs Medicaid
Posted by Advocate Aaron on April 25, 2009 · Leave a Comment
How much do you know about Medicaid? If you’re like most people, you know that Medicaid is a program that assists low-income families with health care expenses. And, like most people, you might assume that Medicaid serves only as a vehicle for providing health care coverage to those who cannot afford it – but the stark reality is that Medicaid’s economic influence is far-reaching and provides benefits to everyone from low-income families to seven-figure CEOs.
Many states are considering Medicaid budget cuts, failing to realize that doing so will set off a chain of events that will spiral the economy into an even more dismal state. Consider the findings of this FamilyUSA brief (http://www.familiesusa.org/assets/pdfs/state-budget-cuts-2008.pdf), which demonstrates how Medicaid benefits keep the natural process of trade ticking. Cutting Medicaid budgets means states lose matching federal dollars, which are used throughout statewide spending cycles:
These new dollars pass from one person to another in successive rounds of spending. For example, health care employees spend part of their salaries on new cars, which adds to the income of auto dealership employees, enabling them to spend part of their salaries on washing machines, which enables appliance store employees to spend additional money on groceries, and so on. Economists call this the ‘multiplier effect.’
Everyone benefits when Medicaid is available: the most vulnerable citizens are provided with life-giving care, companies make money and employees have money to spend. Without Medicare, everyone suffers.
Medicaid already plays a very large role in health care and economic issues, and the ability of the program to sustain or expand services will have an even larger impact over the next several years. More layoffs and increasing medical expenses, coupled with a ‘less for more’ mentality among health care insurance providers, means more people will need Medicaid at a time when families have fewer extra dollars to spend. If millions are without Medicare, and states are not pulling additional federal funding, entire economies face collapse.
In this Business Insurance article (http://www.businessinsurance.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=14045&pageNo=1), Kaiser Family Foundation President and CEO Drew Atlman states: “… we may be seeing the tip of the iceberg of a trend toward less comprehensive, skimpier insurance for many working people with higher deductibles and higher out-of-pocket costs.”
While Altman is referring to employer-provided insurance policies, the same factors that are influencing private insurance carriers to offer less-appealing insurance are influencing state legislatures to consider Medicaid cuts. Medical care costs are rapidly increasing while fewer people are able to afford health care coverage.
Money will never negate the need for health care. Cutting Medicaid benefits will never make the population less dependent on health care. Medical procedures will not suddenly be deemed unnecessary because Medicare is cut. More people will not purchase their own insurance policies if Medicaid is unavailable.
Medicaid cuts are not the solution, and will do more harm than good to state budgets, companies, employees and all citizens nationwide.
