Two from the Times

I'm grateful to live in a state where we had a political leader with enough humanity to expand Medicaid coverage to nearly 170,000 low income working West Virginians. (Yes, that would be Gov. Early Ray Tomblin.) Unfortunately, that isn't the case in many states. If you want to see what the all too predictable pattern looks like, click here.

Meanwhile, the Times ran this editorial last week on the case of former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship, who is facing federal charges in the wake of the Upper Big Branch mine disaster which killed 29 WV coal miners.

Some good news, with an example of misinterpretation of the obvious

Let's start with some good news: last week, the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported that the number of uninsured West Virginians has fallen below 10 percent, thanks largely to Gov. Tomblin's decision to expand Medicaid back in the year of grace 2013. That decision alone has brought coverage to 165,000 West Virginians.

The Daily Mail side of the editorial pages thinks this is a bad thing because it presumably disincentives work. That might be the case if employer-provided health insurance was the norm. Apparently the editorial writer didn't get the memo that employer-provided health insurance is declining and never was an option for millions of US workers. Another memo that was apparently lost would have explained that you have to work to qualify for the expanded Medicaid program.

The calendar of wonks

You may have missed it, but yesterday was something of a major holiday amongst policy wonks such as myself. I am referring to what is called "Poverty Day," when the US Census releases data on poverty, incomes, and the uninsured for the previous year.

As you might expect for the worst year of the worst recession since the Great Depression, things were pretty bad out there. Here's part of a statement by Robert Greenstein of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:

The Census Bureau data for 2009 reflect the severity of the recent recession, as poverty rose sharply and the number of uninsured spiked…. Both the number and percentage of Americans in poverty climbed. The number of poor people rose by 3.7 million, to 43.6 million. The percentage of people in poverty rose from 13.2 percent to 14.3 percent.

Poverty would have risen much higher without the temporary expansions in unemployment insurance benefits provided by the Recovery Act and other legislation. In 2008, unemployment benefits kept 900,000 Americans out of poverty. In 2009, by contrast, unemployment benefits kept 3.3 million Americans out of poverty, an analysis of today’s data shows. The majority of the increase in UI benefits in 2009 came from the Recovery Act

Here's the full statement.

The number of uninsured Americans climbed to over 50 million in 2009. That's something to think about as politicians on the right dream of undoing this year's steps toward covering all Americans. Greenstein notes that

the increase in the ranks of the uninsured would have been substantially greater if not for Medicaid and CHIP, which covered more people as the number of people lacking employer-based insurance swelled. These findings underscore the relevance of the recently enacted health reform law, which substantially expands coverage for people who cannot obtain insurance through an employer. Had health reform been in place in 2009, the number of people without health insurance would have risen far less.

Things aren't all that great in El Cabrero's beloved state of West Virginia, as the WV Center on Budget and Policy reports, although they haven't been as bad as might be expected based on previous recessions.

NOTE: Goat Rope missed a rare day of posting due to some of those curve balls that life ha a way of throwing.

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