New York’s Medicaid Spending Soars Amid Industry Lobbying
Medicaid was supposed to be for the poor and disabled, which should be 1/6 10 to 15% of our population but now it’s serving 1 in 3 statewide and New York City many estimates 1 in 2. And many of those people have jobs and most of them are not disabled. They are generating income. They have some ability to pay for their own insurance, but they are enrolled in Medicaid, which is no cost, the taxpayers are paying the entire cost. Whatever the reasons are it’s changed the nature of Medicaid. It’s now become a kind of catch-all Insurance plan for people who don’t have insurance. This has been a chronic issue, not just in New York, but all over the country. so, to the extent there is a crisis, it’s not driven by anything that changed in Medicaid. To the contrary, Medicaid has been increasing its effort. But, it remains lower than the other insurers and so that becomes an arguing point for the industry, which is you are underpaying this and that’s unfair.
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