As an Enrollment Specialist and a formerly uninsured, I can personally say, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a success .. for those who qualified. I went from uninsured to peace of mind, for less than $30/month. Many of my clients also qualified for reasonable, often quite low rates (deductibles too); I referred those who did not to Central Healths Medical Access Program (MAP). And, those who didnt qualify for insurance through the ACA but earned too much to qualify for MAP ... they fell through the cracks, the gray area created because TX refused to participate in Medicaid Expansion. As a council member, I will work with health care professionals to network services,, closing service gaps and networking services; work with government entities to push through Medicaid Expansion and minimizing the gray area. Health care is for everyone, not only those who can afford it. _____________ Texas AFL-CIO E-Mail News July 14, 2014 Affordable Care Act Is Immense Policy Success, Krugman Says The Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. Obamacare, was rendered a political piñata upon its inception. But that cant alter the truth, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman argues, calling the law an immense policy success. We have said from the outset that the law is historic and far-reaching, and the worst development is that states like Texas have turned their backs on an opportunity to apply the law to tens of thousands of people in the working poor category. Texas is in the process of leaving $100 billion in federal funds on the table - and of making a deadly decision to stop Texans from obtaining health care under a national law - because its leaders are cocksure that their principles should override the needs of our citizens and economy: Many of the attacks have involved predictions of disaster, none of which have come true. But absence of disaster doesnt make a compelling headline, and the people who falsely predicted doom just keep coming back with dire new warnings. Consider, in particular, the impact of Obamacare on the number of Americans without health insurance. The initial debacle of the federal website produced much glee on the right and many negative reports from the mainstream press as well; at the beginning of 2014, many reports confidently asserted that first-year enrollments would fall far short of White House projections. Then came the remarkable late surge in enrollment. Did the pessimists face tough questions about why they got it so wrong? Of course not. Instead, the same people just came out with a mix of conspiracy theories and new predictions of doom. The administration was cooking the books, said Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming; people who signed up wouldnt actually pay their premiums, declared an array of experts; more people were losing insurance than gaining it, declared Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. But the great majority of those who signed up did indeed pay up, and we now have multiple independent surveys - from Gallup, the Urban Institute and the Commonwealth Fund - all showing a sharp reduction in the number of uninsured Americans since last fall. Ive been seeing some claims on the right that the dramatic reduction in the number of uninsured was caused by economic recovery, not health reform (so now conservatives are praising the Obama economy?). But thats pretty lame, and also demonstrably wrong. For one thing, the decline is too sharp to be explained by what is at best a modest improvement in the employment picture. For another, that Urban Institute survey shows a striking difference between the experience in states that expanded Medicaid - which are also, in general, states that have done their best to make health care reform work - and those that refused to let the federal government cover their poor. Sure enough, the decline in uninsured residents has been three times as large in Medicaid-expansion states as in Medicaid-expansion rejecters. Its not the economy; its the policy, stupid.
Posted on: Tue, 15 Jul 2014 05:08:51 +0000
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