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Medicaid, Low Income Pools, And The Goals Of Privatization, Laura Hermer

Faculty Scholarship

This article examines the Bush Administration's attempts to transform certain supplemental payments, most notably Medicaid’s Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) program, into a means of subsidizing private health coverage for Medicaid expansion populations. Greater private market involvement in the state disbursement of supplemental payments such as DSH makes it more difficult to fulfill Medicaid’s original goals. It reduces the overall funds available specifically for care, provides beneficiaries with leaner benefit plans than those offered by the public system, and hinders beneficiaries from obtaining and retaining care. As such, it increases waste and inefficiency, rather than reducing them. At the same time, …