What Has Your County Lost Because Rick Perry Won't Expand Medicaid?

We all know that Rick Perry's refusal to expand Medicaid is leaving over 1 million Texans in a coverage gap and $6 billion of dollars on the table each year. But want to know just how much worse off he's making your county?

An interactive tool from the Center for Public Policy Priorities shows the benefits that a Medicaid expansion would bring to each county. According to their analysis, expanding coverage in Texas would would create over 300,000 jobs, reduce business tax penalties by at least $266 million, increase local tax revenues by $525 million and increase annual retail sales by $7.2 billion.

Meanwhile, this week at the Texas GOP Convention, Rick Perry told the crowd, "Some states took the bait of Obamacare and they expanded Medicaid. We did not. And we will not subscribe to federal blackmail." Because according to Rick Perry, a 9-to-1 federal match to insure 1 million people is blackmail.

Every major city in Texas stands to insure tens of thousands of people, and in some cases even hundreds of thousands of people. There would be over 202,000 newly insured in Harris County, 125,000 in Dallas County, 72,000 in Tarrant County, 70,000 in Bexar and Hidalgo Counties, 49,000 in El Paso County and 40,000 in Travis County, to name a few.

More at http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/15308/what-has-your-county-lost-because-rick-perry-wont-expand-medicaid