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Our View

Arkansas’ Medicaid woes continue

Regardless of what the liberal politicians, the leftist media or Democratic loyalists want to believe, Arkansas’ expanded socialistic Medicaid program is simply unsustainable.

There is this delusional idea government should provide full health care to everyone without any real serious thought as to where the money will come from to pay for it all short of raising taxes.

Well over eight years have gone by since the liberal Democrats in Washington went along with a socialistic president who conned us into believing government could and would provide “affordable” health care, which we all know now was a bold face lie.

The real slap in the face to middle-class Americans now is our do nothing Republican lawmakers, who control the House and the Senate, have absolutely failed to fulfill a promise to do away with President Barack Obama’s so-called Affordable Care Act.

Here in Arkansas as more and more “poor” residents qualify for free or subsidized health care costs have surged past expectations. In fact Arkansas’ expanded Medicaid program grew by almost 24 percent during the fiscal year that ended June 30, surpassing what state bureaucrats initially projected by about $200 million, bringing the total cost to an alarming $1.9 billion, $38.4 million of which came out of the pockets of Arkansas taxpayers. The federal government paid the rest, as it does in every state health care program.

And get this, spending on the traditional Medicaid program, which covers low-income people increased 4.3 percent, the largest percentage increase since 2012.

Since becoming Arkansas governor, Hutchinson has made it one of his priorities to address this very serious and costly problem. One of Hutchinson’s plans calls for trimming the growth of spending in the traditional Medicaid program by enough to save $835 million over five years, as well as a request the state has submitted to the federal government to move about 60,000 people off the expanded Medicaid program.

It is obvious with good intentions on the part of Republicans lawmakers in Little Rock to get government subsidies to the well over 230,000 Arkansans on a sustainable path but, unless politicians in Washington do something to repeal and replace Obamacare this may just be impossible to achieve.

And the reason is that under the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, states that expanded Medicaid, such as Arkansas, weren’t required to contribute their own funds to cover the newly eligible enrollees until Jan. 1, when they became responsible for 5 percent of the cost. The state’s share will climb to 10 percent by 2020.

From June 30, 2016, to Jan. 30, enrollment climbed from about 302,000 to more than 334,000. It then dropped to 309,000 as of June 30, 2017 due to the fact there was an effort to identify people who are no longer eligible. Bear in mind people, the total population of Arkansas isn’t but 2.9 million.

Another thing Hutchinson is doing is to move 600,000 people off their government subsidies starting Jan. 1 by restricting eligibility to those individuals with incomes of up to the poverty level.

The situation remains that this entire socialized health care program is a failure and until the politicians we elect to represent all of us in Washington states such as Arkansas will simply continue throwing good tax money after bad.