Thank you, Mississippi taxpayers, for funding Medicaid expansion in 40 other states

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Happy Tax Day, when millions of us Mississippians will send our hard-earned money to 40 other states that are providing health care coverage to millions of poor, working people.

But here in Mississippi, hundreds of thousands of poor, working people are not afforded that same benefit of our taxes. This is the intentional result of political ideologues who have blocked the implementation of Medicaid expansion, the proven federal policy those 40 other states have passed.

Today, while all those other states reap the economic benefits of our money, so many of our fellow Mississippians are sick and cannot afford trips to the doctor; dozens of our state’s hospitals remain on the verge of financial collapse because they must cover emergency care to so many of those uninsured people; and our state is missing out on a pot of billions in federal dollars that we are paying into every single day.

If these facts surprise you, know that you’ve been duped. As Mississippi lawmakers seriously consider Medicaid expansion for the first time since it was implemented in 2013, opponents of the policy have worked to deliberately message an outright lie in order to rile you up. What they want you to hear and react to is that hardworking Mississippi taxpayers like you shouldn’t be on the hook for expansion.

But they don’t want you to consider the cold, hard truth of the matter: You already are on the hook for expansion — only the federal taxes you’re paying today are flowing to the 40 other states that have chosen to expand. Your own state, meanwhile, because of the cold shoulder of a few politicians, has left more than $10 billion on the table over the last decade.

Today, our neighbors across the Mississippi River in Arkansas and Louisiana are grateful for our money considering we’re helping save their residents’ lives and their hospitals. Across the nation, 20 Republican-controlled states and 20 Democrat-controlled states appreciate our red state’s contribution to their economies that are growing faster than ours.

But here in Mississippi, people are dying, our hospitals are cutting services or closing doors for good, and our economy is not keeping up with our neighbors.

Your tax dollars could benefit your own state — not just the many people who need health care, but the state as a whole and even your own personal bottom line. If lawmakers expanded Medicaid, the state would receive $1.5 billion in additional federal money in year one, which would free up hundreds of millions of dollars our leaders could spend on other major needs besides just health care. The Medicaid expansion dollars would provide a lifeline for the many rural hospitals that are the heart of so many of our struggling small towns. Expansion would create 11,000 jobs in five years, grow the state’s coffers as much as $44 million annually, increase the state’s gross domestic product and even modestly grow the state’s population.

Without Medicaid expansion in place, you’re paying more for health care even if you currently have your own private insurance. Your out-of-pocket health care and insurance premium costs today are higher, experts say, because your providers are charging you more to help offset their costs of having to pay for uninsured patients.

You don’t have to take my word for it.

Republican Speaker of the House Jason White, whose traditional expansion proposal is being considered at the Capitol: “We’re sending our dollars to the federal government. And it’s going to 40 other states to fund an expansion population of low-income workers.”

North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, the most recent state leader to usher through expansion: “We were in the same situation in North Carolina for a long time, but Mississippians should know they’re propping up North Carolina’s and other states’ programs.”

Dr. Joe Thompson, the Arkansas surgeon general under Republican Gov. Mike Huckabee and Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe: “It’s important to note that the residents of Mississippi and the other holdout states have not been spared from paying for Medicaid expansion. They have been helping to fund it for over a decade through their federal tax dollars, but the money has been flowing into states like Arkansas and Louisiana instead of benefiting the working poor, hospitals, and economies of their home states.”

Today could be the final Tax Day that Mississippians are forced to burn their own cash without getting the return that we need and deserve. All it takes is the will to be honest about the situation and a couple votes from the Legislature.