Taking Coverage Away From People Who Dont Meet Work Requirements
The Administration released guidance in January 2018 that lets states take away Medicaid coverage from people who arent working or engaged in work-related activities for a specified number of hours each month. In Arkansas, over 18,000 Medicaid beneficiaries almost 1 in 4 subject to the new rules lost coverage in 2018 as a result.In New Hampshire, almost 17,000 people or about 40 percent of those subject to work requirements would have lost coverage had state policymakers not put the policy on hold. In both states, evidence suggests that people who were working and people with serious health needs who should have been eligible for exemptions lost coverage due to red tape.
For people with serious health needs, even the temporary loss of access to medications or other treatment could be harmful or sometimes catastrophic. This is one reason why major physician organizations oppose work requirements, including the American Medical Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, American College of Physicians, American Osteopathic Association, and American Psychiatric Association as do the AARP, Catholic Health Association, Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities, and many organizations representing patients, including the American Heart Association, American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, and American Diabetes Association.
Making It Harder For States To Finance Their Medicaid Programs
The Trump Administration proposed a rule in November 2019 that would make it harder for states to pay for their share of Medicaid costs. If finalized, the rule could require many states to change how they finance their Medicaid programs eliminating some financing options that have long been available to states. These changes would dramatically affect state budgets and could lead to significant cuts to benefits, coverage, and provider payments.
The Biden Campaigns Questionable Social Security Claims
The Biden camp justifies its claims about President Trumps proposed cuts to Social Security by pointing to the Trump administrations recent efforts to implement a payroll tax holiday as part of the ongoing efforts to blunt the economic impact of Covid-19. Payroll taxes help fund Social Security, but they are not synonymous with the program.
In August, the CARES Acts supplemental $600 weekly unemployment benefit ran out. Negotiations for a second stimulus package among the White House, the House Democrats and the Senate Republicans were going nowhere fast. In response to the deadlock in Congress, President Trump enacted a payroll tax holiday by executive order.
Ending the payroll tax has been something of a pet goal for President Trump, even though economists say it wont do much to alleviate the pain endured by laid-off workers.
At the end of the year, the assumption that I win, Im going to terminate the payroll tax, which is another thing that some of the great economists would like to see done, Trump said in mid-August. His political team tried to clarify and massage those comments later, saying Trump was referring to his executive order to defer payroll taxes.
At the end of August, the chief actuary at the Social Security Administration penned a letter saying that removing payroll taxes would cause funding for Social Security to run dry by the middle of 2023.
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How The Courts Might React
The lack of evidence that the new financing option would advance Medicaids goals of providing health care to the poor could stop the experiment from going forward. Absent such proof, judges may decide it is not permissible under the Medicaid law.
Federal judges have already blocked Medicaid work requirements, another change in the program that the Trump administration has encouraged, on precisely those grounds.
But the new financing option may run into an even bigger legal problem. The Medicaid statute specifies which parts of the program states can change, and the federal funding arrangement is not on the list.
Legal experts have been warning about this possibility for months, following early reports that this new initiative was under consideration. In Thursdays press call, Verma said these critics didnt understand what the administration was trying to do and that the new initiative is fully consistent with Medicaids rules.
I think a lot of those charges are from folks that havent actually reviewed what we put out there, Verma said. We are not changing how the financing is structured.
That may or may not be a desirable goal, Bagley told HuffPost, but its not the kind of change the law would seem to allow: It looks to me like is trying to make a fundamental change to the Medicaid financing structure even though its not allowed to make fundamental changes to the Medicaid funding structure.
Savings Accounts To Benefit The Wealthy And Healthy
The executive order proposes wider access to Medicare Medical Savings Accounts , which are available to those enrolled in high-deductible Medicare Advantage plans. Like health savings accounts , the money in MSAs is tax-free and can be used toward health care costs, including dental, hearing, and vision. While high-deductible health plans and MSAs can be a good value for relatively healthy seniors who have high enough incomes to afford to fund these accounts, they may not provide adequate financial protection for those who need first-dollar coverage or have greater health needs.
President Trump has previously proposed turning MSAs into a tax shelter, which would chiefly benefit the wealthy. Trumps FY 2020 budget proposed allowing seniors to deposit additional funds into MSAs beyond the plans contribution, as they can with HSAs. Data on HSA contributions show that higher-income individuals are more likely to contribute toward accounts and to benefit more from the tax exemption.
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Republicans Are Abandoning Mitt Romneys Takers Rhetoric
In 2012, Mitt Romney complained that too many Americans were takers who paid no income taxes. One campaign later, Republicans are changing course: On Monday, Donald Trump became the latest Republican presidential candidate to propose exempting more families from federal income taxes.
Trumps plan would eliminate federal income taxes for individuals earning less than $25,000 and married couples earning less than $50,000. That means that more than half of all Americans would owe nothing, including about 31 million households who currently pay at least some tax. Right now, about 40 percent of American households dont pay income taxes, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.
Trumps proposal is essentially a more extreme version of the tax plan Jeb Bush released earlier this month. The Bush campaign estimates that its plan would eliminate taxes for about 15 million families, bringing the share owing no taxes to about 50 percent.
A third major plan, released by Marco Rubio earlier this year, would also increase the number of Americans who dont owe taxes, though by exactly how much isnt clear, according to Kyle Pomerleau, an economist at the Tax Foundation, a Washington think tank.
Trump Broke This Promise From The Beginning
This is Trump on the campaign trail in 2015:
I was the first & only potential GOP candidate to state there will be no cuts to Social Security, Medicare & Medicaid. Huckabee copied me.
Donald J. Trump May 7, 2015
Trumps budgets and the policies he has supported around health care and government spending in Congress reflect the opposite. Some of this can be attributed to Trumps appointed budget chief Mick Mulvaney the former Congress member who was part of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus has long rallied for cutting Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid.
In fact, Mulvaney once bragged to a Politico reporter that he tricked Trump into accepting a proposal to cut Social Security by calling SSDI just disability insurance spinning it to the president as general welfare reform. The idea has been in every single one of Trumps budget proposals to Congress since the president came to office.
Then there was the Republican Obamacare repeal push every bill proposed massive cuts to Medicaid in order to pay for tax cuts elsewhere. Trump supported every iteration of Republicans Obamacare repeal-and-replace bills. He even held a party for House Republicans in the White House Rose Garden when the lower chamber of Congress narrowly passed a proposal that slashed more than $800 billion from Medicaid over 10 years.
Now his policy positions around those programs break from that promise.
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Things To Know About Trump’s Budget Plan For Medicare Medicaid
Trump’s budget would reduce $451B in Medicare spending over 10 years.
Trumps budget is insult to working families: Pelosi
President Donald Trump said he wouldnt touch Medicare before pitching a budget plan that would do exactly that, along with steep cuts to Medicaid. Democrats are calling it savage and heartless, while administration officials are insisting they are only slowing explosive growth in future years and that current Medicare benefits would remain untouched.
Here are three things to know about the election-year fight on health care spending:
Trump proposed spending $1.6 trillion less on future health care spending, including $451 billion less for Medicare.
On Twitter, two days before releasing his budget, the president said, we will not be touching your Social Security or Medicare. It was a promise he also made in his State of the Union address.
Whether he broke that promise depends upon how you look at it.
Theres no doubt the presidents budget plan would whack away at federal spending on health care over the next 10 years, with an estimated $1.6 trillion reduction, including $451 billion less spent on Medicare and $920 billion less for Medicaid.
Overall, HHS stated, funding levels will be no lower each year than they are today.
Democrats were unmoved.
“Dont get in front of an audience and say Im here to protect Medicare and Social Security and put a budget like this forward,” Pelosi told reporters on Tuesday.
201: Trump Issued An Executive Order To Undermine Traditional Medicare And Expand Private Sector Control Over The Medicare Advantage Program
¶ Executive Order Promoted Private Medicare Advantage Plans At Expense Of Traditional Medicare
Trump Executive Order Called For Promoting Private Medicare Advantage Plans. According to Vox, âTrump signed an executive order on October 3 to âprotect and improveâ Medicare with a series of somewhat vague proposals that are aimed at expanding a more market-based approach to Medicare. There are some provisions in this executive order that are largely uncontroversial, like improving network adequacy, expanding access to tele-health, or reducing the time between drugs being approved by the FDA and their being covered by Medicare. But the Trump administrationâs explicit intent to promote Medicare Advantage, a program that allows Medicare enrollees to opt into private qualified plans, could have major implications for the current Medicare system. The order is a bit of a âRorschach test,â said Kaiser Family Foundation Medicare expert Tricia Neuman, one with many possibly interpretations.â
¶ Executive Order Drove Up Costs For Traditional Medicare
¶ The Executive Order Laid the Groundwork To Privatize Medicare
¶ Changes Proposed In Trumpâs Medicare Executive Order May Have Led To Higher Costs For Seniors
¶ The Executive Order Failed To Address High Out Of Pocket Costs And Medicare Advantage Network Navigation
¶ Trumpâs Executive Order May Leave Patients Liable To Pay More And Be Exposed To Surprise Billing
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Future Of Medicare Funding Uncertain Under Trump Presidency
President Donald Trump’s vow to save Medicare from budget cuts is facing a snag as the 2018 budget makes its way through Congress.
The promise, along with maintaining current funding levels for other entitlement programs, was one of Trump’s earliest campaign pledges. “Save Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security without cuts. Have to do it,” he said in his presidential announcement speech.
The 2018 White House budget proposal released in May left Medicare benefits largely untouched compared with Medicaid, which would see a more than $600 billion decrease over 10 years compared to current spending levels. Still, Medicare spending would decrease by more than $50 billion in the next decade compared with current levels.
Though the proposed budget doesn’t spell out large direct cuts to Medicare, cuts to other programs would indirectly affect the senior health insurance program. For instance, the budget included eliminating the State Health Insurance Assistance Program, which provides Medicare beneficiaries with counseling and assistance to navigate the health care system.
However, those cuts won’t necessarily happen because the White House budget proposal is more of a wish list that the president gives to Congress, where both the House of Representatives and the Senate must create and agree on a final budget to be signed by the president.
Lipschutz said the upcoming deadline could pressure Republicans to hastily pass legislation on health care.
Americans Visit The Emergency Room 137 Million Times Per Year At Least 1 In 6 Will Face Surprise Medical Billing
Coalition Against Surprise Medical Billing: Americans Make About 137 Million Emergency Room Visits Per Year. âAt Least 1 In 6 Patientsâ With Health Insurance Will Receive A Surprise Medical Bill. According to Coalition Against Surprise Medical Billing, âSurprise medical billing can break the bank for hardworking Americans with bills totaling thousands of dollars â often in cases where patients were not able to choose their doctor. For example, every year, Americans make about 137 million visits to emergency rooms in the United States. At least 1 in 6 patients who have health insurance will receive a surprise medical bill from a provider or specialist who treated them. Importantly, not all doctors or local hospitals are the culprits behind surprise medical bills. The real issue is when clinical specialists or providers choose not to participate in health insurance providersâ networks â or if they do not meet the standards for inclusion in a network â and can then demand a blank check from patients for their services. These specialty providers are likely to charge substantially more than their peers in other specialties, not accept private insurance, and are not actively chosen by patients. Studies have found that surprise medical bills are most likely to come from emergency medicine physicians, anesthesiologists, radiologists, and pathologists.â
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201: Trump Told Republican Member Of Congress He Was Open To Reform Medicare And Social Security On The First Day Of His Second Term
Ramesh Ponnuru Tweeted That A GOP Congressman Had Told Reporters That Trump Had Said He Was Open To Reform Medicare And Social Security âOn The First Day Of His Second Term.â According to a tweet by Ramesh Ponnuru, âGOP congressman tells reporters that Trump told him he is open to reform of Medicare, SS âon the first day of his second term.â
Trump Told Republican Member Of Congress, âHe Would Not Touch Social Security âUntil The First Day Of His Second Term.â According to Business Insider, âWhen asked about Trump’s level of seriousness on the issue, the Republican said the president would not touch Social Security âuntil the first day of his second term, he told me once.”
- Republican Member of Congress Spoke On Condition Of Anonymity. According to Business Insider, âThe Republican member of Congress spoke with a small group of reporters Thursday about a wide range of subjects on a condition of anonymity. The member said both parties and past administrations were to blame for a lack of effort to reform entitlements, citing a gap in leadership on the issue. âUntil you have an administration willing to actually tackle entitlement reform, the idea that Congress is just going to magically produce it on its own,â the lawmaker said. âEntitlement reform always takes leadership at the presidential level, and it also takes â by the way, real reform takes bipartisanship.”
Imposing Premiums On People In Poverty
The Trump Administration has also given states unprecedented authority to require people in poverty to pay premiums for their health coverage, in spite of extensive research showing that premiums significantly reduce low-income peoples participation in health coverage. These studies show that the lower a persons income, the less likely they are to enroll and the more likely they are to drop coverage when they have to pay premiums. People who lose coverage most often end up uninsured and unable to obtain needed health care.
In Wisconsin, for example, the Trump Administration in October 2018 approved a proposal that lets the state take coverage away from people with incomes below the poverty line if they dont pay monthly premiums. Those with incomes as low as 50 percent of the poverty line about $500 per month for an adult without dependents will lose Medicaid for up to six months if they dont pay premiums.
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Taking Scissors To Safety Net
That sinking feeling youll get if Donald Trump is elected to a second term will be caused by plummeting through the hole in your safety net. The one he plans on cutting.
Social Security snip, snip.
Medicare snip, snip.
Medicaid snip, snip.
In his most recent town hall among some friendly hosts from FOX News the president was asked about plans for his next term, should he be reelected. He spoke of how he believes the economic growth will be tremendous. One of the hosts cut in, saying, But if you dont cut something in entitlements
And Trump interrupted, saying, Oh, well be cutting.
The presidents mostly silent press secretary, Arizonas own Stephanie Grisham, tried to soften the blow by asking people not to hear what they actually heard, tweeting, Fake news POTUS was taking about cutting deficits, NOT entitlements.
Actually, no.
He was talking about cutting entitlements.
And it isnt the first time hes said this.
