Careful What You Wish For

I don't know much at all about this AllKids health care plan that the gov is promoting, other than he is notorious for promoting and pushing expensive projects with no money or every one else's money. Hope this works out for folks like the Evans family, but I'd be wary.

Tracie Evans also told committee members how she and her husband Michael have been married for over 18 years and for the last 15 years, he has worked as a community organizer with a not-for-profit while she home-schools the children. Their four children, Michelle (15 years old), Alisha (14 years old), Janell (13 years old) and son Aaron (11 years old) lack the health insurance they need because the cost of private insurance is out of reach, yet their income is too high to be eligible for state health insurance. Aaron has asthma and they currently pay out-of-pocket for the children’s doctor visits at a nearby clinic.

This also caught my eye below. Somehow, the expansion and involvement of the federal government in this project along with 'it's good for the economy' is also relevant. The "ripple effect":

According to the new Families USA study, All Kids will capture approximately $37 million from the federal government in matching funds for covering more children eligible for Medicaid and SCHIP and for speeding up the payment cycle for all doctors who treat children in the state’s children’s health insurance programs. The $37 million in new federal funds from All Kids will have a direct impact on the state’s economy, since the funds are used to pay doctors, hospitals, clinics and other health-related businesses. Providers then use the payments they receive to buy goods and pay salaries which, in turn, adds more money to the economy that can be spent on other goods and services. Using a U.S. Department of Commerce input-output model, Families USA found this ripple effect, also called the “multiplier effect”, is estimated to generate $87,561,000 in new business activity and $30,769,000 in wages in the first year of All Kids.

Health care is the second-fastest growing industry in Illinois, and among the fastest in the nation. Over the past five years, the health care industry has created nearly 40,000 new jobs in Illinois.

Big government and Big Bureaucracy is definitely rippling and rampant. Just a little concerned about where all this is heading.