REDISTRIBUTION: New State Selected Medicaid Plans Advertise “Free” Cell Phones, “Free” Massages, “Free” Gym Memberships, “Free” Uber Gift Cards

RALEIGH – Medical providers across North Carolina have recently received information about the menu of extra benefits the insurance companies selected by the State to handle Medicaid are offering to attract beneficiaries. In the words of one North Carolina physician, “It’s scandalous!”

True to it’s nature as an “entitlement” program that redistributes wealth under the guise of healthcare, the benefits offered by the insurance blessed by the State are chock full of freebies.

General gift cards; YMCA membership; cell phones with data plans; school supplies; stipends for groceries; massage therapy; Uber/Lyft giftcards.

This is the kind of redistribution program Democrats want to expand to half a million able-bodied adults in North Carolina. “Free” cell phones and Uber rides for everybody.

The menu of freebies for Medicaid recipients is scandalous, of course, because medical providers — doctors and hospitals — don’t just break even, it COSTS them money every time they see a Medicaid patient. Meanwhile, the Medicaid insurance partners are offering generous and sometimes completely arbitrary freebies to the recipients, funded by taxpayers and every medical provider that sees Medicaid patients.

It’s ridiculous. The government has absolutely no justifiable business taking money from hardworking taxpayers to turn around and give others for any reason, let alone free cell phones and Uber rides. Plans providing such ridiculous freebies should never be approved by the State, taxpayers or providers should be getting that money back, and relevant decision makers in the State of North Carolina should be taken to task by taxpayers for perpetuating such an overly generous redistribution of their hard-earned money.

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