• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Kentucky Center for Economic Policy

Kentucky Center for Economic Policy

   

  • About Us
  • Press Room
  • Donate
  • Summer Policy Institute 2023

Research That Works for Kentucky

  • Topics
    • Budget & Tax
    • Criminal Justice
    • Economic Security
    • Education
    • Health Care
    • Jobs & The Economy
  • Types
    • News
    • Op-Ed
    • Research

   

  • About Us
  • Press Room
  • Donate
  • Summer Policy Institute 2023

Copyright © 2023 KyPolicy Privacy Policy Terms & Conditions Sitemap

Analysis

Momentum Growing Among States to Abandon Barriers to Medicaid Coverage

Dustin Pugel | October 31, 2019

Amid lawsuits, health coverage losses and high administrative costs, four of the ten states that have gained federal approval to take Medicaid coverage from people who don’t meet a work reporting requirement have halted their implementation. Two additional states, including Kentucky, have been forced to suspend implementation by court order. Kentucky should join the states that abandon their plans by fully withdrawing its own, which the state estimates would cause about 100,000 people to lose Medicaid coverage and would be especially expensive to implement.

Indiana is the most recent state to stop implementing its plan to take away health coverage through a voluntary suspension citing a pending lawsuit over its plan, which is very similar to Kentucky’s. Arizona voluntarily withdrew its Medicaid plan earlier this month and Maine withdrew its request in January. Arkansas’ and New Hampshire’s plans were struck down by the same judge that shelved Kentucky’s plan twice (New Hampshire had already suspended its policy prior to the court ruling). Citing coverage losses and administrative complexity, health officials in Michigan are also contemplating a suspension of their plan.

More On Health Care: Nearly 250,000 Kentuckians Covered by Medicaid Will Need to Take Action to Stay Covered


States also face the enormous cost of implementation. A recent GAO report highlighted the administrative cost of implementing a Medicaid work requirement in five states. It found that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services should have done a better job making sure resources were spent appropriately, and should have counted these administrative costs against the requirement for budget neutrality when approving waivers.

Kentucky stood out among the five states both in its inclusion of spending that violated CMS guidance and in the amount it would spend. The $271.6 million Kentucky expected to spend implementing the new barriers to coverage was more than the other four states combined. 

Evidence shows work reporting requirements don’t work to improve employment or wages, and can even drive people deeper into poverty. They have a 20-year track record of taking basic cash and food assistance from people who need help making ends meet, and evidence out of Arkansas shows the same would be true for health assistance through Medicaid. Indiana, Arizona and New Hampshire realized this and withdrew their plans.

With Kentucky’s long-term struggle to improve health and reduce poverty, the best thing for us to do is to follow suit by revoking our own plan to erect barriers to Medicaid coverage. We don’t need another court ruling to tell us that spending more money to cover fewer people will leave us worse off as a state.

Updated December 13, 2019

FacebookTweetLinkedInEmail

Primary Sidebar

Get KyPolicy news updates in your inbox

Sign Up

Sidebar

Perspectives

Shorting State Workers’ Pay Hurts Us All

Cutting Bourbon Industry Taxes Harms the Communities That Sustain It

Lawmakers Should Help Our Kids, Not Lock More Up in Failing Juvenile System

Income Tax Reduction Is Another Blow to Rural Kentucky

Kentucky Should Not Volunteer for Greater Inequality by Becoming More Like Tennessee

Other Health Care Items

pexels cottonbro studio 5867700

Analysis

Nearly 250,000 Kentuckians Covered by Medicaid Will Need to Take Action to Stay Covered

Mother child and doctor

Analysis

Kentucky Will Start Providing 10,000 More New Mothers with a Year of Postpartum Medicaid Coverage

Family doctor visit

Analysis

The 2021 Legislative Session Health Care Wrap Up: Steps in the Right Direction

Ky. Policy

Footer

Research that works for Kentucky

433 Chestnut Street, Berea, KY 40403

Phone: 859-756-4605

General information and inquiries: info@kypolicy.org

   

Help us make the facts free and accessible to everyone. That’s how Kentucky will thrive.

Donate

  • Topics
    • Budget & Tax
    • Criminal Justice
    • Economic Security
    • Education
    • Health Care
    • Jobs & The Economy
  • Work
    • News
    • Op-Ed
    • Research
  • About Us
  • Press Room
  • Contact

Get KyPolicy news updates in your inbox

Sign Up

Copyright © 2023 KyPolicy Privacy Policy Terms & Conditions Sitemap

made by P&P
Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!