By Robert Kraig
Governor Scott Walker is threatening to cut 53,000 people off BadgerCare unless the federal government approves a waiver from national standards. As bad as that sounds, the damage caused if the federal government approves Walker’s request may be even worse. The non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau concludes that if the Walker Administration gets its way over 67,000 people will lose BadgerCare, including over 29,000 children.
The issue is much simpler than Governor Walker and his allies make it sound. The complex changes his administration has devised are a smokescreen for forcing tens of thousands of people off BadgerCare in order to enable Walker’s plan to slash $554 million from Wisconsin’s Medicaid programs. It’s that simple.
This would be a major step back from Wisconsin values. BadgerCare is a Wisconsin success story that guarantees health security for over 775,000 people. In addition to low income children, parents, and adults, over 337,000 Wisconsinites with cancer, diabetes, lung disease, and heart disease rely on BadgerCare and Medicaid for coverage.
The rational for BadgerCare is stronger now than it was when it was initiated by Republican Governor Tommy Thompson. BadgerCare has enjoyed bipartisan support because it grew out of a consensus that health insurance companies have utterly failed to provide coverage which is affordable for lower income working families struggling to lift themselves into the middle class.
Since BadgerCare was launched in 1999, the health insurance cost crisis has intensified. Insurance premiums have nearly doubled at the same time that real wages have declined. The worst economic downturn since the Great Depression caused 162,000 Wisconsinites to lose their employer based health insurance, leaving Badger- Care as the last resort for many.
Shockingly, the Walker Administration fails to even admit this crisis. Walker’s Insurance Commissioner recently claimed that the large health insurance companies have kept premiums “manageable,” a view not shared by most Wisconsin families and businesses.
The Walker Administration has misleadingly created the impression that it has no choice but to slash BadgerCare. The fact is that Governor Walker made a conscious choice in his state budget not to ask the wealthy and large corporations to bear their fair share of the sacrifice.
Wisconsin must come to grips with rising health insurance costs, but shifting unaffordable costs onto those least able to afford it does not reduce costs. Slashing BadgerCare actually increases the cost of private insurance, which will end up footing part of the bill for emergency room visits and other uncompensated care for the newly uninsured and underinsured.
The Affordable Care Act, the new national health care law, includes reforms that will focus medical spending on prevention and disease management, reducing costly specialty care and lowering health care costs in the long term. Scott Walker wants to repeal this law, without offering any viable alternative.
The Legislature should reverse Governor Walker’s dangerous attack on BadgerCare, and get to work on bringing health insurance costs under control.
Robert Kraig is executive director of Citizen Action of Wisconsin.
