The Deception of Scale in Obamacare

I would like to draw your attention to a passage from this article concerning states' unpreparedness for expanding Medicaid.

"California has enrolled nearly 2.3 million people so far — almost three times more than the 800,257 the state had anticipated. Enrollment in neighboring Washington more than doubled. Oregon's new enrollments have exceeded estimates by 73 percent.
In Michigan, estimated costs have shot up by 50 percent because of soaring enrollment. Ohio's projected costs more than doubled."

Why, when the Federal government assured us that only 10 percent of the cost would be shouldered by the states, are we seeing this massive collapse of their budgets?

The answer is scale. A puny 10% to the Federal government constitutes an astronomical number on the scale of a state government. This is what opponents have been saying for years. Only now, once the cushy federal money rug is being pulled out, are Governors and legislatures starting to realize the magnitude of their mistake.

Medicaid uses roughly 40% of all new revenue, and has increased by 1600% in the last 30 years. That number would be scary, even completely disregarding expansion.

This year the Republican-controlled General Assembly responsibly budgeted a pay increase for teachers, state employees, and relevant contractors. They identified funding for two new Veterans' care centers, and restored the education budget from shortfall-related cuts by $42 million.

If they had expanded Obamacare to Virginia, those things would not have been possible.

VA GOP Caucus

vagopcaucus.blogspot.com

Shots in the Arm Becoming Obamacare Addiction

Virginia Dems want you to believe that Virginia is foolishly turning down free money from Obamacare. What they don't want to believe themselves is that this money will start a process which has proven that it can bankrupt states.

Of the below states, Vermont, Oregon, Nevada, New Mexico, Hawaii, all failed, and had to default to healthcare.gov. Translation: that money is basically sunken loss. 

Roughly 900 million dollars, poof. Gone. For nothing. I wonder who is on the hook for that.

Maryland and Massachussetts completely scrapped their programs and started fresh this year. That second chance must be going well, right? 

Massachussetts promptly started lying to the federal government. Maryland's restart was hamstringed by the fact that they misallocated almost 80 million more dollars (through incompetence or design is not clear; though my money is on incompetence). And the fun doesn't stop there. 

this photo is courtesy of the Washington Post

California's exchange, Covered California, is going to run an 80 million dollar deficit in its first year. Their Governor further plans to court another failed exchange in Oregon to merge with them. 

The logic here astounds me, let's take something that we couldn't build right with OVER A BILLION DOLLARS, and take responsibility for a failed program with a sunken cost of 300 MILLION MORE. 

5 billion dollars later, 6 YEARS of focus from the largest bureaucracy IN THE WORLD later, and we are in a worse place than we started. But by all means, keep digging... 

Is the average family saving $2,500 dollars on premiums yet? 

VA GOP Caucus

vagopcaucus.blogspot.com