Obamacare Does Violence To State Budgets

One more thing we've learned about what's in now that we've passed it.

The new health care law could shift billions of dollars from cash-strapped states to the federal government by changing the way Medicaid prescription-drug rebates are treated, according to state and industry officials and an examination of Medicaid spending data.

Democrats included a provision in the law that’s intended to raise $38 billion over 10 years by requiring drugmakers to offer bigger discounts to Medicaid, the joint federal-state health insurance program for the poor. The rebates will continue to be divided between the states and the federal government, but under the new law, Washington will get a bigger share beginning this year.

...All but three states — Arizona, Massachusetts and New Mexico — stand to lose money because of the change, in many cases millions of dollars a year, according to a state-by-state examination of 2009 Medicaid spending records by Kaiser Health News.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/News-Flash-Obamacare-will-cost-states-Why-didnt-they-report-this-before-the-vote-92083169.html#ixzz0mDDTJfzJ