No one really knows how many Americans are without health insurance. It is certainly not the 29 or 45 million number given by the Democrats (depending on whether you count illegal aliens or not). But even an honest attempt to get a grasp on how many want insurance, need insurance, but can't afford it falls short because of a variety of factors.
One thing is absolutely certain, however. And that is, the number of people getting their insurance from the government is about to explode. And surprisingly, the biggest increase will not come from citizens who choose the public option, but rather from a vast expansion of Medicaid rolls in the states.
Deroy Murdock writing in the New York Post:
Heritage scholar Ed Haislmaier inspected June 2008's Medicaid-population data in his paper "Does ObamaCare Turn Your State into a Medicaid Monster?" ObamaCare would invite childless, non-elderly adults into Medicaid for the first time and extend benefits to those earning 133 percent of the federal poverty line: $29,326 for families of four, or $14,403 for individuals. ObamaCare's parameters would boost the average state's Medicaid-eligible population by 36.6 percent. Americans on Medicaid would jump 15.9 million -- from 43.5 million to 59.4 million. The 14.5 percent of the nation on Medicaid today would climb to 19.9 percent.
Meanwhile, Nevada's 188,885 on Medicaid would swell by 155,000 eligible to 343,885, an 82.1 percent increase.
"The Medicaid expansion that Reid is ushering through the Senate as a component of ObamaCare would impose an unfunded mandate on Nevada that likely would require yet another round of tax hikes," says Geoffrey Lawrence, the Nevada Policy Research Institute's fiscal policy analyst. "The proposed 82.1 percent expansion in Nevada's Medicaid-eligible individuals could require more than $1 billion annually in additional expenditures. Those funds would come out of new taxes on businesses and individuals that would impede job creation."
In Baucus' Montana, the Medicaid populace would zoom 80.7 percent, or by another 63,000, from 78,068 today to 141,068 post-ObamaCare.
Yes, it's another unfunded, open ended mandate forced upon states by the federal government and designed to hide the true costs of national health care reform. At a time when state budgets look like Swiss cheese, these Medicaid costs will only add a few more holes that will need to be filled by taxpayers at the state level.
Remember: It's not about health care reform; it's about politics and saving the Obama presidency.
Hat Tip: Ed Lasky
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