The Moral Case for Reforming Medicaid

Six in 10 able-bodied adults on the healthcare program have no earned income

WSJ editorial. Excerpts:

"Medicaid . . . spends more than $850 billion a year"

"More than six in 10 able-bodied adults on Medicaid report no earned income, according to a report from the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA)"

"Democrats claim those on Medicaid are working. You’ll hear statistics like this one from the Kaiser Family Foundation: 92% of able-bodied Medicaid adults under age 65 worked full or part-time, or were indisposed for a good reason such as caring for a relative or attending school.

But that figure is derived from government survey data, which are self-reported and rely on sample sizes as small as a few dozen. FGA, by contrast, obtained administrative records from state Medicaid agencies in 23 states, a far more complete picture of earnings for nearly 21 million able-bodied adults on Medicaid. It found that millions are declining to work at all, which is damaging to the country economically and culturally."

"Detractors of this eminently reasonable policy cite a 2020 study in Arkansas, which found work requirements didn’t increase employment. That study is a telephone survey and included enrollees who likely weren’t even subject to the work requirement, among many other shortcomings.

FGA’s more robust state data found 14,000 enrollees departed Arkansas’s program because their income increased"