ObamaCare has put Americans on road to insolvency

Well, if this trend continues, it could bankrupt both federal and state governments.

Medicaid is already America’s third largest government program, trailing only Social Security and Medicare, as a proportion of the federal budget. Almost 8 cents out of every dollar that the federal government spends goes to Medicaid, totalling $265 billion a year.

Indeed, already Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid account for 48% of federal spending. Within the next few years, the three programs will eat up more than half of federal expenditures.

Surprisingly, Congress has failed to reform Social Security or Medicare. With ObamaCare (the Affordable Car Act) adding to 

Medicare spending, Americans are picking up speed on the road to insolvency.

The Congressional Budget Office projects that, in part because of ObamaCare, Medicaid spending will more than double over the next 10 years, topping $554 billion by 2023.

And this is just federal spending.

State governments pay another $160 billion for Medicaid, the single largest cost of government, crowding out education, transportation and everything else.

New York spent more than $15 billion on Medicaid last year, roughly 30% of all state expenditures. The Kaiser Foundation projects that over the next 10 years, New York taxpayers will shell out some $433 billion for the program.

Every bit as bad as the cost is the fact that for all this money, recipients are going to get pretty lousy health care.

Of course, one might say that even bad health care is better than no health care. But, unfortunately, for Medicaid, that’s not true.

The Oregon Health Insurance Exchange study recently concluded that while Medicaid spending increased from $3,300 to $4,400 a person, there has been no significant improvements in measured physical health outcomes.

Other studies also show that Medicaid patients often wait longer and receive worse care than the uninsured.

While Medicaid costs taxpayers a lot of money, it pays doctors very little. On average, Medicaid only reimburses doctors 72 cents out of each dollar of costs. ObamaCare does attempt to address this by temporarily increasing Medicaid reimbursements for primary care doctors, but then, that increase expires at the end of next year.

Obviously, because of the low reimbursement, and the red tape that accompanies any government program, many doctors limit the number of Medicaid patients they serve. Sometimes, they even refuse to take Medicaid patients at all. 

Even when doctors do still treat Medicaid patients, they often have a harder time getting appointments and face longer wait times. One study found that among clinics that accepted both privately insured children and those enrolled in Medicaid, the average wait time for an appointment was 42 days for Medicaid compared to just 20 days for the privately insured. 

No wonder, many Medicaid patients show up at the emergency room for treatment. They can’t find a doctor to treat them otherwise.