That was the name I gave the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), before it even had a name, 10 years ago this month.
It appeared in a paper I wrote for Citizens for a Sound Economy Foundation titled “MediKid: Whose Idea Was This, Anyway?” At the time, I foolishly hoped the paper would head off this Orrin Hatch/Ted Kennedy love-fest. CSEF issued the paper just as the House and Senate were about to go to conference on different versions of the program.
Ten years later, MediKid is about to expire. As Congress and the president are trying to figure out just how much more to spend on this ill-advised program, I thought it would be fun to share a few gems from my 1997 paper:
Read the rest of this post →Congress is about to cast one of its most damaging votes ever against children’s health. Taking a page from the Clinton administration’s playbook, Congress will soon vote to expand government-run health care for children and continue the slow march toward imposing government-run health care on everyone. Instead of wasting over $8 billion on “MediKid” proposals, Congress should help parents protect their children’s health by providing additional tax relief to families…
Congress has debated the issue of uninsured children under the premise that 10 million American children are unable to obtain health coverage — a premise that is utterly false. In fact, fewer than two million children in the U.S. are chronically uninsured.