As the old saying goes, when you're in a hole, stop digging. Unfortunately, Gov. John Bel Edwards keeps digging Louisiana's fiscal hole deeper, looking for tax increases to “solve” the state's fiscal shortfall. He should instead examine the massive Medicaid expansion under Obamacare, the spending on which will only add to Louisiana's budgetary woes.
Only two years ago, Edwards took office pledging that expanding Medicaid to able-bodied adults — that is, adults of working age without dependents — would see “only” 300,000 individuals added to the government health care rolls. Then, within weeks of taking office, Gov. Edwards revised his numbers upward, claiming that expansion could cover up to 450,000 individuals. But by November 2017 — less than eighteen months after the expansion took effect in Louisiana — the state had already exceeded the maximum number of individuals ever projected to enroll in the program.
