MEDICAID CUTS AND YOUR CHECKBOOK

MEDICAID Funding cuts have been happening across the United States over the past three to five years. Almost every state in the union has experienced funding cuts for mental health programs. The Feds claim that no decrease in services will occur because of these cuts. How would they know? Speaking as someone, who has worked on the ground level of social services, working with the mentally ill and the mentally challenged,I can tell you that services have been weakened.

Most fiscal experts of the federal government work with numbers, not people. Cutting funding means cutting services, cutting hours spent with people needing help, and cutting their ability to find and maintain a better quality of life. You cannot literally rob Peter to pay Paul without disrupting services being offered to people with disabilities. It?s simply another government smoke screen which covers the real issues in our country, over-spending.

There?s an interesting phenomenon existing in how we calculate a balanced budget in our country. We cut into every entitlement and service given to the poor and downtrodden in this country. However, we continue to give entitlements to the very rich of this country. We continue to pour billions into war efforts and foreign aid, yet we declare fiscal soundness? Our national debt increases at a rate of over two billion per day. It is increasing so fast that the National Debt Clock situated in New York City will be unable to accommodate the numbers when they get passed 9.99 trillion.

Money experts will tell you that the two, national indebtedness and balancing your budget, aren?t closely tied to one another. Look at this way. Between the house, car, and credit cards, you owe $200,000. Yet, you can still balance your checkbook and maybe keep a few hundred back every year for savings. You?re in debt ?up to your eyeballs," but yet you can still balance your checkbook. No big deal, right? Maybe not, but let say you decide you?re tired of living in your shabby surroundings and decide to buy a home worth a half a million bucks. Oops! Now the payments get bigger and you have to get a second job to keep your checkbook balanced. You might even have to give up those weekend golfing outings and cut back dining out to keep your checkbook balanced.

Our country is no different. Our government keeps spending more and more and the payments are getting higher and higher. The president wants to balance the budget. So what happens? He and the state governors cut back on expenditures. Unfortunately, they choose to cut back on entitlements for the poor and disabled, who no longer will eat out at Wendy?s. They don?t cut back the entitlements for the rich, who still eat in the best restaurants in town.

Our local, state, and national governments are no longer giving poor people the chance to eat at Wendy?s, it?s White Castle (the poor man?s fast food joint) or nowhere. Funding cuts effect our disabled and our poor. Don?t let anyone tell you otherwise.