Michigan

Note: This isn't limited to Michigan...many of the items listed here could/should be applied in other states as well.

Dear Governor Whitmer & Michigan State House and Senate Members:

If you're familiar with me and this site, you probably know two things about me:

  • 2. Having said that, until universal coverage is feasible at the federal level in one way or another, I strongly believe that it is vitally important to protect, repair and strengthen the Affordable Care Act even if it ends up being replaced by something else in the near future.

Just days after a lawsuit was filed challenging Michigan's impending Medicaid expansion work requirements, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer sent a letter to legislative Republicans urging them to stop throwing good money after bad on a policy which is pretty much doomed to failure anyway:

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said delaying implementation of work requirements for enrollees in Michigan's Medicaid expansion program would prevent the state from potentially wasting at least $1 million.

The Democrat issued a special message to legislative leaders Tuesday, a day after saying the Republican-controlled Legislature should pause the rules taking effect in January.

Whitmer said the state has spent $28 million to implement the workforce engagement requirements and is on track to spend an additional $40 million this fiscal year — an unnecessary expense if a federal judge blocks the rules.

Back in March I wrote an analysis of H.R.1868, the House Democrats bill which comprises the core of the larger H.R.1884 "ACA 2.0" bill. H.R.1884 includes a suite of about a dozen provisions to protect, repair and strengthen the ACA, but the House Dems also broke the larger piece of legislation down into a dozen smaller bills as well.

Some of these "mini-ACA 2.0" bills only make minor improvements to the law, or in ways which are important but would take a few years to see obvious results. Others, however, make huge improvements and would be immediately obvious, and of those, the single most dramatic and important one is H.R.1868.

The official title is the "Health Care Affordability Act of 2019", but I just call both it and H.R.1884 (the "Protecting Pre-Existing Conditions and Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2019") by the much simpler and more accurate moniker "ACA 2.0".

Back in March I wrote an analysis of H.R.1868, the House Democrats bill which comprises the core of the larger H.R.1884 "ACA 2.0" bill. H.R.1884 includes a suite of about a dozen provisions to protect, repair and strengthen the ACA, but the House Dems also broke the larger piece of legislation down into a dozen smaller bills as well.

Some of these "mini-ACA 2.0" bills only make minor improvements to the law, or in ways which are important but would take a few years to see obvious results. Others, however, make huge improvements and would be immediately obvious, and of those, the single most dramatic and important one is H.R.1868.

The official title is the "Health Care Affordability Act of 2019", but I just call both it and H.R.1884 (the "Protecting Pre-Existing Conditions and Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2019") by the much simpler and more accurate moniker "ACA 2.0".

Michigan

As my friend, U of M Law Professor and former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Sam Bagenstos just noted, this was pretty much inevitable:

BREAKING -- Poverty rights group files suit in federal court against work requirements MI has enacted for those on expanded Medicaid program Healthy Michigan.

— Gongwer News Service (@GongwerMichigan) November 22, 2019

A lawsuit has been filed challenging Michigan's new Medicaid work requirements that take effect Jan. 1. Plaintiffs are 4 people enrolled in the Medicaid expansion program known as Healthy Michigan #MiLeg

— David Eggert (@DavidEggert00) November 22, 2019

Fellow U of M law professor Nicholas Bagley already has the legal complaint itself:

HEALTHCARE TOWN HALL: A PLAN FOR OAKLAND COUNTY

Please join us for a Health Care Forum with Andy Meisner. We will be focusing on the issues and proposed solutions for Oakland County.

November 12th, 6:30pm in Room 218 at West Bloomfield High School, 4925 Orchard Lake Road, West Bloomfield

Panelists include:

Back in August, I posted an analysis of the preliminary 2020 premium rate filings for the ACA Individual Market here in Michigan based on the actual filing forms from each of the 11 carriers participating in the market.

At the time, I concluded that the weighted average change marketwide was a 2.1% reduction in premiums compared to 2019, for around 333,000 Michiganders on the Indy market. This would mean roughly a $10 average premium reduction per unsubsidized enrollee per month, or $122 per year:

Back in March I wrote an analysis of H.R.1868, the House Democrats bill which comprises the core of the larger H.R.1884 "ACA 2.0" bill. H.R.1884 includes a suite of about a dozen provisions to protect, repair and strengthen the ACA, but the House Dems also broke the larger piece of legislation down into a dozen smaller bills as well.

Some of these "mini-ACA 2.0" bills only make minor improvements to the law, or in ways which are important but would take a few years to see obvious results. Others, however, make huge improvements and would be immediately obvious, and of those, the single most dramatic and important one is H.R.1868.

The official title is the "Health Care Affordability Act of 2019", but I just call both it and H.R.1884 (the "Protecting Pre-Existing Conditions and Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2019") by the much simpler and more accurate moniker "ACA 2.0".

Back in March I wrote an analysis of H.R.1868, the House Democrats bill which comprises the core of the larger H.R.1884 "ACA 2.0" bill. H.R.1884 includes a suite of about a dozen provisions to protect, repair and strengthen the ACA, but the House Dems also broke the larger piece of legislation down into a dozen smaller bills as well.

Some of these "mini-ACA 2.0" bills only make minor improvements to the law, or in ways which are important but would take a few years to see obvious results. Others, however, make huge improvements and would be immediately obvious, and of those, the single most dramatic and important one is H.R.1868.

The official title is the "Health Care Affordability Act of 2019", but I just call both it and H.R.1884 (the "Protecting Pre-Existing Conditions and Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2019") by the much simpler and more accurate moniker "ACA 2.0".

Back in June, I noted that the Michigan legislature was trying to slap a band-aid on the terrible GOP-passed & signed Medicaid work requirement bill (aka "God's Safety Net" bill) which passed about a year ago.

As you may recall, the original bill added fairly draconian work requirements to Michigan's implementation of the ACA's Medicaid expansion program, known here as "Healthy Michigan". Around 670,000 Michiganders are covered by the program (the number fluctuates between around 650K - 700K from week to week) today.

At the time, several reports had come out putting the number of people likely to lose healthcare coverage under the new requirements (which go into effect on January 1st, 2020) as high as 183,000 statewide, or as much as 28% of the total covered population...thousands of whom would lose coverage even if they do comply with the rules but aren't able to comply with the reporting requirements.

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