Dear Colleague:

It has been said time and again during budget debates that our country’s budget is a statement of our priorities.  The Republican’s 2012 Budget includes drastic cuts to Medicare and Medicaid while permanently guaranteeing tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires and giving new tax breaks to some of the world’s most profitable companies that currently don’t pay any taxes at all.  While that is a strong statement of their misplaced priorities, it is also now clear that their budget will cost our recovering economy 2 million jobs.  The facts are clear:  this budget will FIRE over 2 million hard-working Americans.

The Republican Budget plan would convert Medicaid into block grants for states.  The amount of the block grants are not designed to keep pace with the growing cost of health care, meaning that states will be forced to either cut benefits or shoulder the increased cost burden.  Recent history would suggest that states will choose to make cuts within the Medicaid program, such as reducing eligibility, cutting benefits, or reducing payments to providers.

CBO projects that this budget will cut Medicaid by $207 billion over the next five years.  The Economic Policy Institute analyzed these cuts and found that they would cost our economy 2.1 million jobs.  These are primarily private sector jobs in health care industries, like nursing homes and medical supply firms.  That’s not all – these cuts threaten health care access for seniors, children, and low-income Americans.

We need to focus on producing a budget that supports our recovering economy and creates jobs for the American people.  Republicans instead are pushing a Road to Ruin budget that destroys jobs for middle-class Americans.

Sincerely,

Paul D. Tonko

Member, Committee on the Budget