{"id":17157,"date":"2013-02-08T20:15:00","date_gmt":"2013-02-09T01:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=17157"},"modified":"2013-02-08T20:15:00","modified_gmt":"2013-02-09T01:15:00","slug":"indiana%e2%80%99s-pence-wants-sensible-reform-to-medicaid-expansion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/17157\/indiana%e2%80%99s-pence-wants-sensible-reform-to-medicaid-expansion\/","title":{"rendered":"Indiana\u2019s Pence Wants Sensible Reform to Medicaid Expansion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Like Ohio\u2019s John Kasich and four other Republican governors<\/a>, Indiana\u2019s Mike Pence seriously considered expanding Medicaid eligibility under ObamaCare.\u00a0 But unlike Kasich & Company, Pence ultimately decided against<\/a> it when HHS refused to grant him one sensible reform.<\/p>\n

Established under Mitch Daniels, Pence\u2019s predecessor, the Healthy Indiana<\/a> program allows uninsured adults aged 19-64 to use a state-based health savings account to pay for medical expenses, such as doctor\u2019s visits, hospital services, diagnostic tests, and prescription drugs.\u00a0 Incentives apply to reward cost-effective spending, but it\u2019s critical to point out that the spending decisions within the account are determined by the policyholder, not the state.<\/p>\n

In order to go along with expansion under ObamaCare that increases the eligibility pool for Medicaid, Pence asked permission to use Healthy Indiana accounts to help keep costs down.\u00a0 The request is imminently reasonable.\u00a0 If the purpose of Medicaid expansion is to cover uninsured people, why not let Indiana migrate a state-based program with a 94% satisfaction rating<\/a>?<\/p>\n

Predictably, Kathleen Sebelius\u2019 Department of Health and Human Services said no, preferring to retain federal control over coverage and spending.\u00a0 Without a program like Healthy Indiana in place, costs are likely to spiral upward since Medicaid beneficiaries are not tethered to the consequences of their spending decisions.<\/p>\n

So, Pence said no to the Medicaid expansion.\u00a0 But I think it\u2019s crucial to understand that his response was not a kneejerk reaction against helping the uninsured get normal access to healthcare.\u00a0 Instead, he proposed a sensible reform that would have accomplished the same goal as Medicaid expansion, but with more cost certainty for the state budget, and thus less tax receipts from taxpayers.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve speculated before that Pence might be the GOP\u2019s best bet<\/a> in the 2016 presidential race.\u00a0 A moment like this, even when it doesn’t result in a \u201cwin\u201d politically speaking, helps confirm that suspicion because it’s based on sound principles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Like Ohio\u2019s John Kasich and four other Republican governors, Indiana\u2019s Mike Pence seriously considered expanding Medicaid eligibility under ObamaCare.\u00a0 But unlike Kasich & Company, Pence ultimately decided against it when HHS refused to grant him one sensible reform. Established under Mitch Daniels, Pence\u2019s predecessor, the Healthy Indiana program allows uninsured adults aged 19-64 to use […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3887,4014,4029,3308,186,781,232,780,913,35,1447],"class_list":["post-17157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-3887","tag-care","tag-expansion","tag-health","tag-hhs","tag-indiana","tag-medicaid","tag-mike-pence","tag-mitch-daniels","tag-obamacare","tag-reform"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17157"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17157\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17161,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17157\/revisions\/17161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}