TAX NEWS - June 2010

Children's health pays a price for state's failed tax system

If you think we can just cut taxes and make everything all right in Michigan, or that we don't need to reform public employee compensation and benefits, you really need to take a look at the study released last week by the Ann Arbor-based Center for Health Care Research and Transformation.

In stark numbers, it shows the cost of disinvestment in Michigan. It shows how our children are getting shortchanged while Republicans and Democrats in Lansing squabble over their "principles."

If there's any reason for not only legislators, but also Michigan's citizens, to be moved to action in solving the state's long-term revenue troubles, this would seem to be it.

According to the report, Michigan slipped from leading the nation in the number of insured children in 2005 to sixth place by 2008. Some 10,000 of the state's uninsured children are eligible for federal aid but aren't enrolled because the state has sharply reduced outreach efforts, according to Marian Udow-Phillips, who directs the center that issued the report.

How shameful is that?

Rather than require high-income families to pay more, or tax services that right now generate no revenue, Michigan is willing to let kids go without health insurance. Rather than ask state workers to confront economic realities that everyone in the private sector has dealt with for years, Michigan will fill emergency rooms with children who can't get primary care.

Priorities that far out of whack merit serious reordering. And when you consider that the total uninsured population in Michigan has reached 40%, according to the report, the need for swift action becomes even clearer.

In a few years, as national health care reforms take root, the number of uninsured is expected to go down. Michigan would be a pretty big beneficiary if all goes as planned.

But we ought not to wait for that. Michigan can stop shredding its health insurance safety net by stabilizing the budgets in Lansing through tax reforms and compensation and benefits changes.

If a sense of obligation to Michigan's children isn't sufficient inspiration, maybe the state's embarrassing slide from national leadership on this issue will be.