New Taxes Imposed by the Federal Health Care Takeover
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is expected to cost trillions and increase the national debt by hundreds of billions of dollars. All in all, taxpayers are looking at $669 billion in new taxes over the next 10 years to pay for the federal health care takeover.[1] This is in addition to billions of dollars in regulatory fines and fees.
Dr. Jameson’s Taylor’s Senate Judicary Subcommittee Meeting Testimony
I am Dr. Jameson Taylor, Director of Policy with the South Carolina Policy Council. As you may know, the Policy Council is a non-profit, non-partisan think tank dedicated to safeguarding the rights and liberties of the people of South Carolina.
S.C. Medicaid: More Spending, Lower Quality Care on the Horizon
As the Policy Council has previously reported, South Carolina’s Medicaid spending has increased rapidly in recent years. South Carolina already spends more than 20 percent of its total $21 billion budget on Medicaid alone. For FY07-2008, total statewide Medicaid expenditures were $4.7 billion. Medicaid enrollment is also growing rapidly: Medicaid enrollment in South Carolina has […]
The Best and Worst to Come: A Review of Health Care Policy for 2009-2010
As we review the best and worst health care legislation of 2009, it’s also time to begin to consider what ideas are likely to remerge during the 2010 session. Since session ended in June 2009, the federal health care debate has overshadowed anything that might have happened at the state level. At several town halls […]
Why Tort Reform Needs to Be Part of Health Care Reform
Authors: SCPC and Geoff Pallay At the mention of tort reform at any one of the recent health care town halls across the state, crowds cheered with delight. Virtually no one — whether conservative or liberal — opposes the idea of tort reform. And why should they? This popular initiative could reduce health care costs […]
Managed Care Provides Quality, Affordable Health Care
Authors: SCPC and Ashlee Landess For the past two years, pro-tax legislators in the General Assembly have talked about raising taxes to cover the extraordinary growth in Medicaid. Such measures have not succeeded, in large part because many lawmakers, including those in the House and Senate leadership, recognize the need to reform the system to […]
Dose of Healthy Competition Wakes up DMH
Authors: Edward T. McMullen Recent efforts to trim the fat off the sacred cow of state government has produced a strong whiplash by the defiant Department of Mental Health. In the last quarter of 1997, it was rumored that the cost to care for a consumer in our state hospital ran more than $300.00 […]
Patient-Centered Medicaid Reform
Authors: SCPC and Neil Mullen Medicaid is the Social Security program providing health care for those with low or limited incomes and special needs. Initially designed in the 1960s, it has seen only limited change in the last four decades. It delivers an essential service for the needy, but the nature of its structure is […]
South Carolinas Dilemma: Increase Taxes or Reform Medicaid?
South Carolina is facing a serious crisis in providing funding for healthcare services to low-income persons through its Medicaid program. Clearly policymakers are faced with a critical dilemma either increase taxes to cover the funding shortfall for this program or actually sit down and evaluate the effectiveness of the entire Medicaid system. Yet even before […]