State and federal spending on health care in California has nearly doubled in the past seven years. Yet state lawmakers are meeting this week to consider raising taxes to spend even more. What’s going on?
The answer lies largely in the rapid expansion of the Medi-Cal program, which will soon provide health care to nearly 1 in 3 Californians. At the same time, the federal government has disallowed a creative financing scheme the state was using to maximize federal money for the program.
Combined, these two events will leave the state more than $1 billion short of what it needs to fund Medi-Cal next year, according to Gov. Jerry Brown.
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