people will die otherwse - all states should have opted into the medicaid expansion

all states should have opted into medicaid expansion it basically amounts to politics alone being the reason people are dying. obamacare included a medicaid expansion for people with low income. (people with more than little income are part of the normal obamacare insurance exchange program, that may or may not include subsidies. the main reason the states should have opted into the expansion, is because so many people will die if they don't. an estimated 17,000 people will die because they opted out of the expansion. http://healthaffairs.org... https://scontent-a-ord.xx.fbcdn.net... also, getting medicaid to one's state is a financial boon to that state. it causes funds to flow to the state. it's in the states interest to take the money. even if there were some strings attached, or a co pay with teh state, overall it is more beneficial cause it's basically free money, at least with respect to the state. also, government run insurance is known to be more cost effective than other programs anyways... usually. the USA spends 17% of its GDP on healthcare, and has worse results than other developed countires. the other countires spend 10% on health care and get better results. most of those countires have govenment health care. (some have tightly regulatd private markets, but this is getting into another debate) also, the states can work with the federal government to create their own program. it's not like they are without options. while there may be principled reasons to be against the expansion, none are sufficient to overcome the above points. even if you quibble with some of the points, the fact that 17000 people will die otherwise is sufficient reason to take the expansion. if you have quelms with the system, work to reform it. in the mean time, take what you got. the polticians knew it would make them look bad to take the expansion, so they went against it. it basically amounts to politics alone being the reason people are dying. ---------------------------------- what about the argument that states don't want to give up their autonomy or increase their bank rolls? what if con said this? con basically said. all states accepted orgiinal medicaid as it gave them money, helped poor people to some degree, and allowed the states to determine eligibility. con says many don't want the expanded medicaid because in this version they would be religuishing control of elibility, and having to pay a portion of the bill. con admits that that portion is ten percent. the problem. states on average already pay 43% for its beneficiaries under the old rules. under the new rules, they only pay 10%. and more to hte bottmline, the average state's share after the new rules are estimated to range as an increase of only 1.1 to 2.8%. http://www.cbpp.org... so states would be according to con, quibbling about losing a little more money, but while at hte same time getting a ton more money in return to their state. getting that large of influx of cash to your state, for such a small obligation yourself, is a no brainer in terms of stimulating your economy, at least from the perspective of the states. also, states would be according to con, placing a relatively small degree of control over their dealings, inproportioally higher than the amount of money they can get, and above the value of the human lives involved. is it worth getting a lot of money to your state and saving a lot of lives.... in return for a very small state budget increase, and very relatively small reliquishment of control? yes, it definitely is.