Policymakers in Medicaid expansion states likely will try to extract some cash from hospitals starting in 2017 to help pay for the expansion. 2017 is when the federal government will no longer pay the full bill for the coverage growth.
Higher-than-expected enrollment means that Medicaid expansion states will owe hundreds of millions dollars more than they anticipated when they took advantage of the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion to adults earning up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. So some states may try to get money from the hospitals to pay for the added expense.
Under the ACA, the Feds pick up the full cost for newly eligible adults through next year. After that, the match gradually drops to 90 percent by 2020.
Still, Medicaid expansion reduces state costs in other ways while boosting jobs and economies.
Modern Healthcare says one option is “to have hospitals contribute through the system of assessment fees already being collected by many states. Since the 1980s, provider assessments have generated billions of dollars to help states boost the matching funds they receive from the federal government. In 2015, 38 states had such levies in place, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.”
