MittCare More Expensive Than Expected

Mitt Romney is going to be facing questions about this for the rest of the primary season. His health care program is likely to go overbudget in the coming year; between $147 and $619 million overbudget.

The program intended to sign up 136,000 people by June 30, 2008 for the subsidized insurance program. They've already signed up 133,000. Now they're working on coming up with new funding:

Options include appropriating more money, using funds allocated to care for those without insurance, or cutting extra payments to certain hospitals that were included in the law mandating insurance.

The state's budget chief, who also oversees the subsidized insurance program, indicated that the state is not considering a cap on enrollment.

And overenrollment is the least of their worries. Starting in the next fiscal year, insurers are expected to raise their prices for those taking part in the government programs. The cost of heathcare in general is also rising.

The article includes these amusingly contrasting views:

The enrollment boom "is a sign of success, not failure," said John McDonough, executive director of the advocacy group Health Care for All. "The sky is not falling. There's a budget challenge."

[...]

"This is one of many warning signs, especially in tandem with the projected state budget deficit and the skyrocketing cost of healthcare in the state," said Alan Sager, professor of health policy and management at the Boston University School of Public Health. "The [healthcare] law is very shaky on the revenue side."

On the one side, a grown man who apparently believes that money grows on trees. On the other, one of those annoying throwbacks to capitalism who keeps insisting that things must be paid for.

posted by Gabriel Malor at 03:07 AM

| Access Comments