A Sad Day for Kids
Yesterday was a sad day for the nation's children. Best estimates are that when President Obama signed the bill expanding the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) he insured that 2 million kids will lose their private insurance coverage and enroll in the state program instead.
While privately insured, most of these children had liberal access to doctors and facilities in the area where they live. But since SCHIP typically pays well below markets and often pays Medicaid rates, the children will now have limited choices. And as the number of people paying below market swells, it exacerbates the rationing problems faced by all the current enrollees.
The bill Barack Obama signed will reduce, rather than increase, access to care.
It is sad. See my reference to Gruber’s work in a comment to the previous post.
The amazing thing is that Obama and the Capitol Hill crowd actually think they did something good.
What happened to the idea, advanced by Obama during the election campaign, that a public plan should compete agsinst private plans. Shouldn’t that suggestion also apply to SCHIP?
You missed a real opportunity here, John. You should have paired “96 Tears” with this post.
How about 2 million tears?