The Children 's Health Insurance Program

The primary social welfare issue to be addressed is the absence of affordable, comprehensive health insurance for children from birth to eighteen.

On June 28, 2012, The Supreme Court ruled the Federal Government does not have the constitutional right to sanction an individual to buy health insurance, but declared that the states do have the right to place a tax on citizens that do not carry insurance. This ruling is in response to President Obama’s Patient Protection and Healthcare Act of 2010. Passed on March 23, 2010, President Obama’s Reform Act mandates Texas, as well as the nation, to provide Medicaid funding to all individuals that are uninsured by 2014. As well as expanding Medicaid, it will provide exchanges, which are pools of insurance companies a previously uninsured person can pick

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) which was passed by Congress was implemented to improve the quality of health care and reduce the cost of health insurance in the United State. America spends more on health care than any other industrialized nation in the world. In North Carolina, the governor signed a bill to block the state from extending the ACA which will allow Medicaid to cover group of individuals that are uninsured. North Carolina rank 33rd of the 50 states in population measures in 2012 and rank 38th in health outcome (Siberman, 2013). In 2010-2011 approximately 1.7 million people were uninsured and had barriers to access health care in North Carolina as

Prior to 2014, NC’s uninsured and uninsurable populations were staggeringly high. Medicaid and the NC Healthy Choice (NCHC) safety net programs are state-run plans with their own unique coverage laws. NCHC is not considered an entitlement program so children could be placed on a wait list until additional funds were found for this program. This left many children without healthcare coverage. In 2009, NC’s Medicaid and NCHC program laws made it impossible

Expanding Medicaid was supposed to to be a main element in the states wide acceptance of the Affordable Care Act, because Medicaid’s sole purpose is to provide coverage for all uninsured adults. Medicaid is mainly used by the working poor or those who don 't make enough money to pay for health insurance on their own. The expansion, however, is part of ObamaCare and Texans hate it, despite the numerous money problems that not accepting it causes. An example would be, the 100 billion dollars that the federal government has set aside for Medicaid over the course of ten years. Even though it seems that the insurance is doing good for many states, Texas Governor Rick Perry could not opt out fast enough. His reasoning behind the

When it validated the constitutionality of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2012, the United States Supreme Court also ruled that states could decide for themselves whether or not to expand their Medicaid programs (Sonfield, 2012). Predictably, South Carolina said no. The Palmetto State’s decision not to expand Medicaid in concert with the Affordable Care Act was wrong, and it is time to correct that mistake.

The Medicaid revisions and expansion under the ACA, exhibited the federal government overstepping their power as they tried to penalize any state governments in opposition of the expansion, consequently, taking away states’ power. The Medicaid Expansion Mandate would’ve compelled states to join due to the loss of federal funding towards Medicaid if they did not adhere to (Phi Le, par.40). The Supreme Court hearing allowed states to have a choice whether or not to participate in the expansion without a total loss of their Medicaid funding. In return, states who didn't participate wouldn’t receive additional funding that coupled with this mandate that required inclusion, extending coverage of those who were at “Income below or ar 133% federal

With the implementation of the ACA, many states have expanded their Medicaid programs to include a larger population of low income individuals and families that were not able to obtain health insurance prior to the law. Some of the issues that state legislators struggle with are the overall cost of providing services for the additional recipients, staying within budget, determining an adequate approach of offering quality care, and providing adequate coverage for each recipient. Even though the cost of Medicaid expansion within each state has increased the budget for the program, new appraisals has shown that Medicaid programs spend less per enrollee than commercial health insurance and much of the increase in Medicaid expenses originate from the increase in enrollment in the programs (Coughlin, Long, Clemens-Cope, & Resnick, 2013).

CHIP is also known as the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) and was created by the 1997 Balanced Budget Act, enacted

In the article, This Is What Happens When Your State Blocks The Medicaid Expansion Jonathan Cohn discusses the impact that the Affordable Care Act has had on the percentage of people that have health insurance in the United States. Cohn goes in depth about what the Affordable Care Act is and why it has been so beneficial to the states that have adopted it, most specifically the expansion of Medicaid. Cohn also addresses the loophole that allows states to opt out of the federal program due to a Supreme Court ruling in 2012 that allows states to block the Medicaid expansion. The new Medicaid expansion has helped lots of Americans get access to health insurance that they would not have had access to otherwise, but some states are not taking

SCHIP stands for State’s Children Health Insurance Program introduced in January 24, 1997. The bill is part of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 which was signed by President William Clinton in August 5, 1997 and became a public law1. The bill allows the States to designate the fund given by the federal government to families that qualifies under certain conditions. However, in September 7, 1997 it received a disapproval bill originating from the House. And in 2007, during the 110th Congressional session, the House introduced the State’s Children Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007, H.R. 3963. The bill is introduced by the House Representative John D. Dingell and was placed under House Calendar No. 141 with one general

enrolled in the new program. The $8 billion includes the state share of costs for both newly eligible adults and the additional Medicaid participation among currently eligible populations that would result from expansion. If all states implemented the Medicaid expansion, federal spending would increase by $800 billion, or 21 percent, compared to the ACA with no states implementing the expansion (Holahan, et al., 2013). Therefore, although the increase in spending per state is relatively small, the cost to our nation is exponential. With the national debt growing day by day, many believe that an exponential increase in national spending is a difficult thing to justify.

The ACA has allowed millions of uninsured Americans access to health insurance through the marketplace, which has helped insure coverage through new tax credits for lower income families and small businesses. The money for the new tax credits however has come primarily from high-earners like many in the upper classes. The most vocal anti-Affordable Care Act groups are those associated with big businesses as well as the top two and three percent of Americans as they are the ones who get hit the hardest by tax reforms. In states that participate in marketplaces, Americans have access to the insurance marketplaces via the state instead of the government, however they are subject to a fee if they do not obtain health coverage. Twenty one states have decided not to participate in state run exchanges, leaving the federal government to run them instead which seems like it would lessen the financial burden on the state but in reality, it forces the federal taxpayers to take care of anti-Affordable Care Act states instead of states providing their

"We don't believe it’s right and we know it's going to basically bankrupt the states."(Hensley 2012) quote given from Texas Governor Rick Perry about Medicaid expanding in Texas. The Medicaid expansion "would simply enlarge a broken system that is already financially unsustainable," he wrote. "Expanding it as the PPACA provides would only exacerbate the failure of the current system, and would threaten even Texas with financial ruin." (Hensley 2012). Texas is among the twenty-two states that did not expand Medicaid, and for good reason at that.

“About 44 million Americans have no health insurance and another 38 million have inadequate health insurance. This means that nearly one-third of Americans face each day without the security of knowing that, if and when they need it, medical care is available to them and their families”