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Trump Administration Will Approve Work Requirements in Medicaid

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The Trump administration is considering to allow states to impose work requirements on Medicaid recipients. Before National Association of Medicaid Directors, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Seema Verma stated that Trump is backing all the measures which help recipients “move up, move on, and move out” of the program.

“Believing that community engagement requirements do not support or promote the objectives of Medicaid is a tragic example of the soft bigotry of low expectations consistently espoused by the prior administration,” Verma stated.

“Those days are over.”

She “defined community engagement as working, volunteering, going to school or obtaining job training.”

“Let me be clear to everyone in this room — we will approve proposals that promote community engagement activities,” she said.

“Every American deserves the dignity and respect of high expectations, and as public officials we should deliver programs that instill hope and say to each beneficiary that we believe in your potential.”

These remarks infuriated the liberals almost immediately.

“Not only will work requirements impede access to health care coverage for individuals who aren’t able to work, but they will also create difficult administrative hurdles for the vast majority of individuals on Medicaid who are already working,” said Catherine McKee, a senior attorney with the National Health Law Program.

According to the rules right now the induvial states can get waivers to Medicaid policies only if they prove that the goal is to extend greater coverage to the poor, McKee said.

“Work requirements do not meet these standards,” McKee said.

First, this will only apply to able-bodied people without kids who can work but opt not to.

Second, the waiver programs are going to be administered under the section of the Social Security Act — known as “Section 1115,” which allows the states to experiment with demonstration projects in order to improve or get federal help.

For example, Kentucky believes it could save up to $2.4 billion over 5 years if able-bodied people without kids could get proper job training for five hours per week.

Other five states, Indiana, Arkansas, Utah, Maine, and Wisconsin also have waivers programs which require for those people to participate or work in some community engagement.

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4 Comments
  • grandmommak says:

    I totally agree with this. Just like the ‘welfare to work” program. People need a hand up not a handout. Those who physically or mentally cannot work are already being taken care of. That will not change. We need to work together as a society and working together to help others move up only makes sense, common sense.

  • Brandon says:

    Just a few serious problems with this that’s literally being overlooked.

    OBAMACARE IS THE OVERALL PROBLEM AND IS ALSO AT THE VERY CORE OF THIS.

    Let’s say this goes through and people who are going through problems (IE: weakness from Chronic Kidney Disease or other ailments that may prevent them from performing any task at a job… whether physical or other) are forced to find a job. The first problem is that to remain on Medicaid, a person would forced to find work or enter a job training program when that person may not have the means to even travel; be it due to financial for public transportation or by a family member. That’s problem number one. Problem number two is the fact that IF the person finds employment, then by law, they would be forced into OMABACARE by default since it’s not been repealed nor even replaced.

    Now, bare in mind that OBAMACARE is now starting to become a completely unaffordable option for at least half of the working class in the nation at this very moment. That bubble when flips over between now and the start of 2018 will grow exponentially worse… meaning that it may double or even triple. At that point, OBAMACARE will no longer become an option for about %50-%60 of all Americans. Socialism at work folks.

    The only way to end OBAMACARE is to completely eradicate it. Congress has failed to do so since Pres. Trump began his term as President. Why… because Congress exempted themselves from OBAMACARE when it first came out. Remember, OBAMACARE only worked on paper as it was a Socialist plan. Nothing born from Socialism ever works when actually applied. Cases in point… Canada’s healthcare system now and Venezuela’s overall dive into total chaos. That’s why Capitalism works because it’s been applied and it continues to function as it should.

    Basically, what I’m saying is that this will end up failing just like OBAMACARE is now. You repeal, replace or flat out get rid of OBAMACARE in its entirety first and return healthcare to what it was before then, then you can force those on SNAP/Food Stamps or Public Assistance to work or enter job training programs if the states haven’t begun to do that by now. Medicaid should remain as it is now by being that option for those who cannot afford other means of healthcare coverage for financial reasons. The other thing that’s being utterly neglected in all of this is the fact that we have way too many illegals with SNAP/Food Stamps, Public Assiatance and Medicaid that need to be removed from it as they are not legal citizens of this nation and are exploiting this.

  • Mike Dar says:

    This will push down on corruption in the Program. End of Story, lolol!. Seriously though, you will see unemployment take another drop, and more people enter the ‘Permanent’ workforce.. they will have to. Watching the numbers on two subsets, Black and Hispanic unemployment when the same was done for food stamps showed a greatly accelerating drop in unemployment for those two subsets 60 days after activation.
    800 billion every year in waste, fraud and abuse includes the social programs…
    more people working more brings in more revenues and can drop levels of needed borrowing and people leaving Social support roles creates happier independent people.

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