Republicans are charging ahead with their plan to cut health care in order to hand out tax breaks to the wealthy and big corporations. They want you to believe that they can cut Medicaid by hundreds of billions of dollars without hurting people. That could not be further from the truth. Every proposal Republicans have brought to the table would rip health care away millions, including seniors in nursing homes, people with disabilities, children, and hardworking families.
Not one dollar should be cut from Medicaid to pay for a dollar of tax breaks for the rich. The nonpartisan CBO has said that the only way Republicans can achieve their goal is by kicking people off Medicaid rolls and taking away services. Whether it’s nearly a trillion dollars, half a trillion dollars, or hundreds of billions of dollars, their plans to slash health care will hurt people.
Any cut to Medicaid will mean Americans lose coverage and access to care:
- A $500 billion cut, as proposed by some Republicans, could throw more than 20 million off their coverage. $500 billion covers health care for ten years for 18.5 million children, 2.7 million seniors, and 2.1 million people w/ disabilities.
- A $250 billion cut could throw more than 10 million people off their coverage. $250 billion covers health care for ten years for 9.3 million children, 1.4 million seniors, and 1 million people w/ disabilities.
- A $100 billion cut could throw nearly 5 million people off their coverage. $100 billion covers health care for ten years for 3.7 million children, 541,000 seniors, and 415,000 people w/ disabilities.
Here’s a closer look at their radical proposals:
- Work reporting requirements would jeopardize coverage for 36 million people
- Cuts to Medicaid expansion would jeopardize coverage for 21 million people
- Adding per capita caps to Medicaid would kick 15 million people off coverage
- Reducing funding for Medicaid expansion would trigger laws that would automatically kick nearly 4 million people off coverage
- Rescinding a new rule that simplified Medicaid paperwork would jeopardize coverage for 1 million people and increase premiums and drug costs for 860,000 people.
- Restricting provider taxes and state directed payments would decrease coverage and access for millions of people across nearly every state in the country.
Any way you slice it, cuts of this magnitude will kick millions of Americans off their health care. Medicaid provides coverage and lifesaving care to 1 in 5 Americans, including:
- Nearly half of all children in America
- 6 in 10 nursing home residents
- Nearly one million non-elderly veterans
- 4 in 10 births
- 20 percent of adults in rural areas
- Over 8 million seniors
- 5.6 million who count on Medicaid for long-term care
- More than 1 in 3 people with disabilities