Georgia publicly touts its Medicaid experiment as a success. Numbers tell a different story. - The Current
thecurrentga.org
In January, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp boasted that his experiment in Medicaid reform was a success, despite low enrollment numbers. Yet a report commissioned by the state and not yet publicly released suggested otherwise.
  • Price of Independence: Georgia’s experimental alternative to Medicaid expansion has cost taxpayers more than $86 million.
  • Enrollment Shortfall: Only 6,500 participants have enrolled in the first 18 months of the program — roughly 75% fewer than the state had estimated for year one.
  • Work Slowdown: The state found it difficult to verify that people are working to keep their benefits, so Georgia has gone from monthly checks to annual ones.
  • jpreston2005@lemmy.world
    11·
    3 days ago

    putting work requirements on healthcare is what damned it.

    Right now, Georgia is the only state that imposes a work requirement for Medicaid coverage. But more than a dozen largely Republican-led states already plan to seek approval from the Trump administration to impose work requirements on Medicaid enrollees.

    Even moving it to an annual work verification isn’t going to help. People are struggling to find and maintain work, so why apply for something that’s going to be stripped from them in the future, through no fault of their own?

    Thousands of others never finished applying, according to the state’s data, as reports of technical glitches mounted. The state also never hired enough people to help residents sign up

    the Pathways program has cost federal and state taxpayers more than $86.9 million, three-quarters of which has gone to consultants

    The whole thing is a republican boondoggle. They imposed requirements that doomed sign-up, then funneled money to their friends companies, all so they could performatively throw up their hands in despair and say “well, I guess government provided healthcare IS just a waste of tax payer money!” Fucking grifters getting people killed because they’d rather play politics than help people.