ObamaCare and the Medicaid Mess

This is an article by Peter Suderman, who is an associate editor at Reason magazine. Click here to read it. From today's WSJ. He shows how high the cost of these programs are and how they will keep rising under ObamaCare. He suggests making Medicaid a temporary program like welfare (from the 1996 reform act), block grants to states that only cover mandatory care and health savings accounts. Excerpts:

"At roughly 21% of total state spending, Medicaid is already the single largest item in state budgets, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers. Between 2008 and 2009 (the latest year for which figures are available), annual spending growth on the program nearly doubled, growing to 9% from 4.9%.

Medicaid currently covers 53 million people at an overall cost of $373.9 billion (states are responsible for about half). But starting in 2014, ObamaCare rules will add about 20 million more, according to Richard Foster, the program's chief actuary.

Yet state budgets are already being squeezed."

He goes on to summarize how some states have dealt with budget crises by cutting back on the programs.