Chris Pope

Senior Fellow, Manhattan Institute.
Opinions my own.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@johnrgraham @mfcannon This is more like when TANF was block granted. It gave states a big incentive to shift TANF beneficiaries to SSI, so they could use the TANF block grant for other stuff.
https://t.co/M1J912v07g

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

Whatever the case for block granting Medicaid may have been 20 years ago, today it would just create an incentive for states to find ways to dump all their Medicaid beneficiaries on the federally funded ACA exchange.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@johnrgraham @mfcannon In both those cases there is no alternative major national funding stream available for healthcare.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

Social Security redistributes slightly progressively if you judge benefits by an interest rate of 2%; regressively if you do so by 4%: https://t.co/FHnX9EsiJL

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@mfcannon let's save these arguments...!

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@mfcannon My point is that with BGs, the feds would end up paying for *both* 1) the beneficiaries previously enrolled in Medicaid, 2) whatever states then do with the BG money.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein It's basically saying:
1) if you want benefits to stay as they currently are, you need to pay for it.
2) if you want the program to just be a safety-net, you can capture the savings from that.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

The only way to fix Social Security is to internalize the advantages of reform: https://t.co/qqcVWJnzM0

[Mike Bird @Birdyword]

In an Economist poll by YouGov, 71% of respondents say Social Security spending should be increased, more than for any other category. Just 5% want it cut, slightly less than the share of Americans who say they believe Covid-19 vaccinations were used to microchip the population.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein Right. For younger people who opt for the lower retirement benefits.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein There's a 3%pt across the board payroll tax increase.
Workers under 45 can get a 5%pt payroll tax cut by opting for safety-net-level benefits in retirement.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein It's a coupling of an across-the-board tax increase with an reformed benefit option that would allow lower taxes.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein I look at a longer time horizon: https://t.co/qqcVWJnzM0

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

When an economist is on your co-op board (@AllisonSchrager): https://t.co/P4GPkbnJBH

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein ...calculations are from p15 onwards in the pdf version of the report.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

@MarcGoldwein A slower growth rate of benefits.

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

If the data shows that the welfare state is regressive, the appropriate response should be to reform the welfare state -- not to add a new tax or say it's OK because the welfare state isn't about aiding the poor.

[Sylvain Catherine @sc_cath]

A translated version of this oped since the argument nearly one-for-one to the US debate

[Brian Blase @brian_blase]

Before the Medicaid managed care plan lobbying organization in the fall of 2024, I debated Chris Jennings.

I said that I’ve seen no evidence that managed care in Medicaid improved quality or lowered costs. I asked for examples…and I’ve still not received anything!

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

Why do states subcontract Medicaid to private insurers if the government provides all the money, tells the insurers what they must cover and how much they have to pay for it, and doesn’t competitively bid the contracts?
https://t.co/NVMzUA52vJ

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

This absence of transparency lies at the heart of Medicaid Managed Care's appeal: its exemption from traditional limits on payments for Medicaid services allows states to obtain much more federal aid. https://t.co/5wiPPHlfPL

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

NEW REPORT: Subcontracting Medicaid to private insurers was supposed to reduce the cost of the program. It's mostly done the opposite.
https://t.co/5wiPPHlfPL

[Chris Pope @CPopeHC]

Subcontracting to private insurers obscures how much Medicaid programs are spending on specific services, and makes it hard to compare the cost and value of the program's expenditures across states.
https://t.co/5wiPPHlfPL