A Massive New Burden for States
October 26, 2009
‘While lawmakers in Washington continue to ring everything up on the government credit card, states actually have to pay their bills at the end of the year’
WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor Monday regarding importance of getting it right on health care reform:
“As the debate over health care continues, I think it’s important once again to remind the American people that every lawmaker in Washington recognizes the need for reform. Health care costs are rising at an unsustainable rate, and if we don’t get these costs under control, we can’t expect to maintain the quality of care or the access to care that most Americans currently enjoy. This is the primary problem with our system, and it’s the primary reason that our nation is engaged in this debate.
“One of the proposed solutions for increasing access is the expansion of Medicaid. This afternoon, some of my Republican colleagues and I will explain why we and many others from across the political spectrum believe that this is a very bad idea.
“The proposal that’s being considered would expand Medicaid to about 14 million new people by 2019, including nearly 250,000 in my own state of Kentucky. On its face, this seems like a potentially effective way to increase the ranks of the insured. The reality, however, is that it would make current problems much worse.
“First of all, Medicaid is already in serious trouble. Leaving aside its exploding costs, the program is increasingly unable to match doctors with patients because a growing number of doctors refuse to see Medicaid patients. This is a serious problem now. It would be a far worse problem if the program is expanded to include millions more without any expansion in the number of doctors willing to see Medicaid patients.
“So while the need to expand coverage is real, Medicaid is exactly the wrong program to choose as a foundation for achieving that goal. Senator Enzi, the ranking member of the Health Committee, put it best when he said that, ‘Instead of trapping poor Americans in a substandard health care plan, we should be giving everyone more options to find the care they need. Senators get to choose between competing private plans; so should low-income Americans.’
“Another reason we shouldn’t be looking to Medicaid as a solution to our problems is that the states, which run the program, are begging us not to. And there’s a simple reason why: the states simply don’t have the money.
“The recession is hitting the states particularly hard, and expanding Medicaid would make their problems far worse. That’s because unlike the federal government in Washington, every state except one is either constitutionally or statutorily required to balance its budget.
“In other words, while lawmakers in Washington continue to ring everything up on the government credit card, states actually have to pay their bills at the end of the year. So if Washington tells them they have to expand Medicaid by $1 billion, that’s $1 billion less they have for something else. For states, expanding Medicaid would almost certainly mean shrinking services or raising taxes — in the midst of a recession.
“It’s easy to see why the bill writers would propose Medicaid as a solution. It’s a lot easier for Washington to push its problems onto the states. But, in the context of reforming health care, this makes no sense at all. Expanding Medicaid would worsen the quality of care for those who already have Medicaid, and new enrollees would be entering a system with even fewer doctors per capita than there already are. Additionally, states could very well be bankrupted by the additional costs imposed by Washington, and even if they weren’t, there’s no doubt that services would be cut.
“This is why governors of both parties are insisting Washington not use Medicaid as a vehicle for expanding health care. Here’s just a sample of what we’ve heard.
“Governor Rendell, Democrat of Pennsylvania, put it this way, quote: ‘We just don’t have the wherewithal to absorb that without some new revenue source.’
“Governor Bill Richardson, Democrat of New Mexico, said, quote, ‘We can’t afford [it], and [it’s] not acceptable.’
“Phil Bredesen, a Democrat of Tennessee, called the plan, quote, ‘the mother of all unfunded mandates.’
“And Ted Strickland, the Democratic governor of Ohio, summed it up like this: ‘the states,’ he said, ‘with our financial challenges right now, are not in a position to accept additional Medicaid responsibilities.’
“Senators who’ve worked in state government also recognize the problem. That’s why so many of them from both parties are expressing serious misgivings about forcing states to expand Medicaid. Just to take one example, Senator Nelson, the former governor of Nebraska, has explicitly said he won’t support the new mandate. As he put it, ‘I will not support saddling the states with further obligations … you can take me out of the governor’s office, but you can’t take the governor out of me.’
“And even Senators who haven’t said they oppose the idea are acknowledging the problem by working behind the scenes to have their states exempted from the mandate or to have it softened — a tacit admission of what the rest of us are saying: that expanding Medicaid is bad for states, and bad if the goal is better health care.
“Republicans tried to keep the idea out of a final health care bill, but those attempts were rejected. It’s a shame, since there are many good ways to increase access without expanding Medicaid — ways that would lead to better care and which wouldn’t harm the states financially. Increasing competition would lower costs and enable those who are currently uninsured to get good private coverage, private coverage that would provide them with far greater access to the care they need than Medicaid would, and which would help lower overall costs for everyone.
“We should look to these ideas rather than looking to Medicaid as the solution to our problems, especially since so many people from both parties are massing against the idea of expanding Medicaid. It’s not too late to seek common-sense solutions to the problem of access. All of us acknowledge the problem. Now’s the time to come up with a solution that all of us — Republicans and Democrats alike — support.”
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WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor Monday regarding importance of getting it right on health care reform:
“As the debate over health care continues, I think it’s important once again to remind the American people that every lawmaker in Washington recognizes the need for reform. Health care costs are rising at an unsustainable rate, and if we don’t get these costs under control, we can’t expect to maintain the quality of care or the access to care that most Americans currently enjoy. This is the primary problem with our system, and it’s the primary reason that our nation is engaged in this debate.
“One of the proposed solutions for increasing access is the expansion of Medicaid. This afternoon, some of my Republican colleagues and I will explain why we and many others from across the political spectrum believe that this is a very bad idea.
“The proposal that’s being considered would expand Medicaid to about 14 million new people by 2019, including nearly 250,000 in my own state of Kentucky. On its face, this seems like a potentially effective way to increase the ranks of the insured. The reality, however, is that it would make current problems much worse.
“First of all, Medicaid is already in serious trouble. Leaving aside its exploding costs, the program is increasingly unable to match doctors with patients because a growing number of doctors refuse to see Medicaid patients. This is a serious problem now. It would be a far worse problem if the program is expanded to include millions more without any expansion in the number of doctors willing to see Medicaid patients.
“So while the need to expand coverage is real, Medicaid is exactly the wrong program to choose as a foundation for achieving that goal. Senator Enzi, the ranking member of the Health Committee, put it best when he said that, ‘Instead of trapping poor Americans in a substandard health care plan, we should be giving everyone more options to find the care they need. Senators get to choose between competing private plans; so should low-income Americans.’
“Another reason we shouldn’t be looking to Medicaid as a solution to our problems is that the states, which run the program, are begging us not to. And there’s a simple reason why: the states simply don’t have the money.
“The recession is hitting the states particularly hard, and expanding Medicaid would make their problems far worse. That’s because unlike the federal government in Washington, every state except one is either constitutionally or statutorily required to balance its budget.
“In other words, while lawmakers in Washington continue to ring everything up on the government credit card, states actually have to pay their bills at the end of the year. So if Washington tells them they have to expand Medicaid by $1 billion, that’s $1 billion less they have for something else. For states, expanding Medicaid would almost certainly mean shrinking services or raising taxes — in the midst of a recession.
“It’s easy to see why the bill writers would propose Medicaid as a solution. It’s a lot easier for Washington to push its problems onto the states. But, in the context of reforming health care, this makes no sense at all. Expanding Medicaid would worsen the quality of care for those who already have Medicaid, and new enrollees would be entering a system with even fewer doctors per capita than there already are. Additionally, states could very well be bankrupted by the additional costs imposed by Washington, and even if they weren’t, there’s no doubt that services would be cut.
“This is why governors of both parties are insisting Washington not use Medicaid as a vehicle for expanding health care. Here’s just a sample of what we’ve heard.
“Governor Rendell, Democrat of Pennsylvania, put it this way, quote: ‘We just don’t have the wherewithal to absorb that without some new revenue source.’
“Governor Bill Richardson, Democrat of New Mexico, said, quote, ‘We can’t afford [it], and [it’s] not acceptable.’
“Phil Bredesen, a Democrat of Tennessee, called the plan, quote, ‘the mother of all unfunded mandates.’
“And Ted Strickland, the Democratic governor of Ohio, summed it up like this: ‘the states,’ he said, ‘with our financial challenges right now, are not in a position to accept additional Medicaid responsibilities.’
“Senators who’ve worked in state government also recognize the problem. That’s why so many of them from both parties are expressing serious misgivings about forcing states to expand Medicaid. Just to take one example, Senator Nelson, the former governor of Nebraska, has explicitly said he won’t support the new mandate. As he put it, ‘I will not support saddling the states with further obligations … you can take me out of the governor’s office, but you can’t take the governor out of me.’
“And even Senators who haven’t said they oppose the idea are acknowledging the problem by working behind the scenes to have their states exempted from the mandate or to have it softened — a tacit admission of what the rest of us are saying: that expanding Medicaid is bad for states, and bad if the goal is better health care.
“Republicans tried to keep the idea out of a final health care bill, but those attempts were rejected. It’s a shame, since there are many good ways to increase access without expanding Medicaid — ways that would lead to better care and which wouldn’t harm the states financially. Increasing competition would lower costs and enable those who are currently uninsured to get good private coverage, private coverage that would provide them with far greater access to the care they need than Medicaid would, and which would help lower overall costs for everyone.
“We should look to these ideas rather than looking to Medicaid as the solution to our problems, especially since so many people from both parties are massing against the idea of expanding Medicaid. It’s not too late to seek common-sense solutions to the problem of access. All of us acknowledge the problem. Now’s the time to come up with a solution that all of us — Republicans and Democrats alike — support.”
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