Should tax cuts for the richest Americans be paid for by health care cuts to children, the elderly, workers, and rural counties?
Should tax cuts for the richest Americans be paid for by children in poor families going hungry, through no fault of their own?
Let me expound a bit on that list of Americans who will lose out in order to fund tax breaks — the bulk of which would go to America’s wealthiest — in the Republican reconciliation bill.
One in six Utah children rely on Medicaid, as do half of our nursing home residents. At the same time, rural hospitals significantly depend on Medicaid. Yet all can expect to lose funding in the proposed reconciliation bill.
Meanwhile, work requirements to access Medicaid sound reasonable. Yet paperwork can be so confusing (purposely so?) that workers are still left out. And then businesses are staffed by less healthy workers, which costs them in the long run.
Food assistance for impoverished kids is also poised for cuts. When little children go hungry it’s a tragedy. More so when these cuts are made to fund tax cuts for the most affluent Americans. Making matters worse, children’s impoverishment can cost us more in the long run. Poverty raises crime rates, which hold their own costs. Next, crime brings additional expenditures for police, courts and prisons. It’s cheaper to feed kids in the first place. And it’s certainly more humane.
I urge Sens. John Curtis and Mike Lee to carefully consider whether the Republican reconciliation bill should be written to harm middle class Americans and poor children in order to benefit the wealthiest among us?
Georgia Platts, South Jordan
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