There should be an help that is progressive from total subsidy to 0, not a system where people below a certain level of poverty (generally very low) level pay nothing (and in some areas can hope they will find a doctor accepting Medicaid) and people above it get kicked out of the system.

So, yes, I know people who chose to forego a small increase because it would have meant they would have lost their insurance (but it is certainly not because they were complacent, more because of good basic economics).

This problem should be solved now with the subsidies.

This said, there are many other problems that need to be fixed about Medicaid. starting by the fact the system is different in each state. I am in MA and it is fairly decent. I am not sure, however, how it is in some Republican states.

But I would not count on the GOP to fix that efficiently however, and democrats are afraid to talk about fixing it. So, it probably is better as it is.

But for the question asked by the OP, I agree with you: the answer is NO.

this is simply an unchallenged meme -- started in part by democrat patrick moynihan years ago.

That does not mean Medicaid could not be improved.

i'm a proponent of good legislative design and bureaucratic engineering.

there is no excuse for sloppiness, red tape, etc just because it's government.

It isn't free--your estate can be recovered.

It's big business for governments, who MUST recover whatever is left in the estate upon your death.

and recovering your estate after 55 is none of my problems (in MA, it is only for nursing homes and I have no estate for it to recover. If I have one some day, I am fine for the state to recover. It actually works this way in most civilized countries in the world).

And no, they MUST not. As I said, Medicaid depends on the state. In MA, they can choose to. So, rather than repeating absurd talking points, you may want to learn how it works.

This said, and I said that as somebody to whom Medicaid saved my life in MA (by access to mammograms detecting an early cancer and paying for care) I agree with the OP. Until we have single payer, Medicaid is more than useful and does not create dependency.

and that's by design, when you can't have more than 900 dollars in assets, outside of personal property, in some states not even being able to own a home, then good luck on the state in trying to collect.

At the threshold for "no medicaid" the subsidy is at or near 100%.

The only reason that there are people left out is that the FUCKING REPUBLICAN COURT elminated the medicaid expansion requirement.

but I have not seen what I would have to pay in premium, deductible, and copay if I came out of the Medicaid zone. I am a little bit fuzzy with the details. But, even if it is not perfect, ACA is a tremendous improvement.

to evade coming right out and saying they don't want to help others.

They need the help? They deserve it. It's others who don't.

And you have to admit, it is rather clever. There might be some truth in it, as there are people who, the more you help them, they less they will do to help themselves. But that could be in other contexts. And it wouldn't include everyone.

hysterical complaints about single mother black households.

It isn't free, either. If over 55 you have to sign on the application that your estate can be recovered upon your death, or, if you die before a spouse, the spouse's death, to REPAY EVERYTHING ever charged on it, including health insurance premiums. That agreement supersedes wills, so you can forget any survivors getting a goddamned dime from your estate.

Medicaid is the LAST thing I want to be on and want to get off it as soon as possible.

My God, you have to have make literally a pittance to even get it, even with ACA expansions, and the government takes your money anyway.

I don't feel quite so bad after reading this thread.

would motivate people to get one of those ever scarcer "good jobs with benefits", or earn enough to get their own insurance. We've tried that for the last 200+ years.


IT DOESNT FUCKING WORK

so we are already dependent on it, its how it should be funded that helps with ease of access that we should talk about. Universal healthcare systems help people have affordable access to a system they are already dependent on.

Persons with conservative orientation have a penchant for rationalizing social classes each class with it's own rewards, and

Calvinistic beliefs include the positions that class structure is a consequence God electing/blessing individuals and their descendants while more unpleasan/demeaning work, at lower wages, is the proper state of those unelected by God, and

A fear by mostly white working class blokes that they have been unfairly taxed to provide undeserving lower classes benefits and privilege that they do not deserve.


The philosophical overlap between conservative philosophy and beliefs of southern rw evangelicals combined in the 70's to create a vortex that sucked up many members of the working class who felt their class privileges threatened by the success of the civil rights act of 1964. These things were the foundation of the GOP's Southern Strategy to pick off what had been working class democrats. They are also the foundation of the working class discontent who populate the Tea-Party.