The Greenlining Blog | Connecting Communities, Issues, Policy & People

MacArthur & Frelinghuysen Put Politics Over People

Posted on May 4, 2017October 10, 2020 by Raymond Castro

Today Congressmen Frelinghuysen and MacArthur put their political party ahead of the health care of tens of thousands of their own constituents by voting to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with a wholly inadequate substitute that will eviscerate Medicaid, drive up insurance premiums and gut consumer protections for people with pre-existing conditions. Thankfully, they were the lone New Jersey Representatives to do so, with the other 10 members – including fellow Republican Congressmen Lance, LoBiondo and Smith – rightly seeing this legislation for what it is: An attack on the health, well-being and economic security of hundreds of thousands of New Jerseyans.

Despite the doublespeak down in D.C., none of the amendments and last-minute additions – including Rep. MacArthur’s own – made this bill substantively better. And they are all built on a faulty foundation of a proposal that strips health care from 24 million Americans, drives up premiums and shifts costs to the states – all in order to deliver massive tax cuts for the wealthiest families.

What This Means for New Jersey

The Upton Amendment is Not a Solution:

Adding $8 billion over 5 years to help protect Americans with pre-existing conditions comes nowhere close to filling the likely gap created by the MacArthur Amendment.

In fact, it would take up to $790 million each year to assist the New Jerseyans with preexisting conditions who would apply for health coverage (and this is a very conservative estimate). Even if the funds from the Upton amendment are added in, the bill would only allocate about $353 million on average – leaving a $437 million gap in New Jersey, the eleventh highest in the nation.

In total, the nationwide gap is estimated to be $20 billion a year – or $100 billion over the five years that Rep. Upton’s amendment would pledge an additional $8 billion. In other words, the Upton amendment fills just 8 percent of the gap.

Background: https://www.njpp.org/blog/new-jerseyans-with-pre-existing-conditions-remain-at-risk and https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/healthcare/news/2017/05/02/431698/house-health-care-plan-not-enough-keep-high-risk-pools-afloat/ and http://www.cbpp.org/research/health/8-billion-comes-nowhere-close-to-meeting-republican-commitments-to-people-with-pre

The MacArthur Amendment Poses an Even Greater Threat to New Jersey Than Original Repeal Bill:

Rep. MacArthur’s amendment retains all the worst elements of the original plan to repeal, and on top of that eliminates key protections for people with pre-existing health conditions and marks a return to the highly-flawed, discriminatory pre-ACA individual insurance market.

In practice, the amendment means that up to 3.3 million New Jerseyans with preexisting conditions would no longer be guaranteed affordable health coverage if they lose their insurance, women would likely be charged more than men for insurance, and plans for up to 3.6 million New Jerseyans could once again come with annual and lifetime limits on coverage – violating promises President Trump and many Republican legislators have repeatedly made to maintain these protections.

Background: https://www.njpp.org/healthcare/macarthur-amendment-to-american-health-care-act-would-cause-even-more-harm-to-new-jersey and http://www.cbpp.org/research/health/fact-checking-claims-about-the-macarthur-amendment

The American Health Care Act is a Horrible Deal for New Jersey:

The original proposal to repeal the Affordable Care Act would be extremely harmful to New Jersey.

Up to a half million New Jerseyans would lose their health insurance
The Medicaid expansion would be phased out, eliminating coverage for 562,000 residents and sharply reduce federal funds for the state’s budget
Permanent structural changes to Medicaid would reduce funding to New Jersey by 20 percent, the largest reduction in the nation, putting health care for up to 1.8 million New Jersey seniors, people with disabilities and children at grave risk.
Approximately 250,000 New Jerseyans who purchase insurance through the Marketplace would see an average increase in out-of-pocket health are costs of $2,740 a year, making insurance unaffordable for many of them.
The state’s alarming gap between the wealthiest and the rest of us would increase, thanks to big tax cuts for the top 5 percent of New Jersey households. The wealthiest 1 percent of households would get an average tax cut of $23,000 a year.
The loss of over $30 billion in federal funds over the next decade due to the Medicaid cap alone would lead to the loss of tens of thousands of jobs.

Background: https://www.njpp.org/healthcare/the-american-health-care-act-would-cause-nearly-half-a-million-new-jerseyans-to-lose-health-coverage and http://www.cbpp.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/4-13-17health-factsheets-nj.pdf

What Would ‘A State Without Immigrants’ Look Like?

Posted on May 4, 2017October 10, 2020 by Erika J Nava

Hundreds of New Jersey immigrants and allies participated this week in a national economic boycott, using the slogan “A Day Without Immigrants.” The idea was for immigrants to miss work and not purchase any goods to make their economic presence felt.

It is hard to measure the economic impact that one day without immigrants would have on New Jersey’s economy, but we know for certain that losing all the state’s estimated half million undocumented residents would be damaging, if not crippling, with the most severe impact in areas where large number of undocumented immigrants live.

If all of the state’s undocumented immigrants were deported, New Jersey would suffer the largest percentage loss of Gross Domestic Product (4.9 percent) of all the states, topping other immigrant-heavy states like California (4.7 percent loss), Texas (3.9 percent loss) and New York (3 percent loss).

In dollars and cents, this would cost New Jersey about $26 billion each year. This does not, however, include ripple effects that deportation would have on the housing market, businesses and local economic activity, which means that the economic loss would be even greater.

Meanwhile, New Jersey’s undocumented immigrants pay $587 million each year in state and local taxes, the sixth highest level of all the states. And the more integrated these neighbors become in our society, the higher their tax contributions. For example, the same undocumented New Jerseyans would pay an additional $73 million – the eighth largest jump of all states – under comprehensive immigration reform.

While reactionary rhetoric and actions toward immigrants and refugees seems to be the “new normal” in the D.C. halls of power, the facts still matter – and they show us that undocumented New Jerseyans are an integral part of our state’s economy.

National Report Dings New Jersey’s Tax Subsidy Programs

Posted on May 4, 2017October 10, 2020 by Jon Whiten

Despite making “billions of dollars in incentive commitments in recent years,” New Jersey “has not adopted a plan for regular evaluation of tax incentives,” Pew Charitable Trusts finds in a new national report. The report identifies the Garden State as “trailing” when it comes to the evaluation of its tax subsidy (or incentive) programs.

Pew’s findings echo our own work that has detailed the shortcomings of New Jersey’s tax break laws and oversight processes. And they came the same day that the Economic Development Authority shed new light on the short-term budget hit this surge in subsidies is expected to cause – a cost of $3.3 billion in this and the next four fiscal years.

It’s no surprise that national researchers have found New Jersey’s runaway tax subsidy programs wanting when it comes to evaluation and oversight. New Jersey’s tax breaks for big corporations have gone from bad to worse in recent years, with lawmakers mortgaging the state’s future to the hilt all in order to put more ribbon cuttings on the political calendar.

After years of reckless subsidy policy that has enriched already profitable corporations at the expense of New Jersey’s taxpayers, it’s time for some common-sense reforms. Restoring some semblance of fiscal sanity to these programs, mandating better reporting and evaluation and pulling back on the rewards for merely shifting jobs around the state would be great places to start.

New Jersey’s Subsidy Surge, at a Glance: (all figures are up-to-date through the EDA’s April meeting)

$7.9 billion: Amount of tax breaks approved since January 2010 (a monthly rate of $89 million)

$5.3 billion: Amount of the $7.9 billion that’s come since December 2013, when the “Economic Opportunity Act of 2013” went into effect (a monthly rate of $128 million)

New Jerseyans with Pre-Existing Conditions Remain at Risk

Posted on May 3, 2017October 10, 2020 by Raymond Castro

Today Rep. Fred Upton is reportedly proposing an amendment to Rep. MacArthur’s amendment to the American Health Care Act that would add $8 billion in federal funding, spread over 5 years, to help people with pre-existing medical conditions pay costly premiums in states that waive the current ACA protections for consumers with pre-existing conditions.

While the proposal still prohibits insurers from turning down anyone with a pre-existing condition, the MacArthur amendment gutted that requirement by including waivers that would allow insurers to charge whatever they want based on a person’s health history and to exclude the very benefit a person with pre-existing conditions would need – like high-cost drugs or cancer treatment.

Rep. MacArthur’s main rebuttal has been that insurers wouldn’t charge more for people with pre-existing conditions because high-risk insurance pools would compensate insurers for the higher cost of covering these individuals. Given the failure of high-risk pools in many states – mainly to a lack of sufficient funding – it stands to reason that, without enough money, these pools would once again fail. And sure enough, the MacArthur amendment – even with the Upton amendment – doesn’t include enough money for these pools.

It would take $790 million each year to assist 37,000 New Jerseyans with preexisting conditions who would apply for health coverage, according to a national analysis released earlier this week by the Center for American Progress. However, if even if the funds from the Upton amendment are added in, the bill would only allocate about $353 million on average – leaving a $437 million gap, the eleventh highest in the nation.

And there are a number of reasons why this gap would likely be even wider. In most estimates there is a margin of error that is often expressed as a range between a lower and upper bound. The Center for American Progress uses the lower bound of 37,000. However, the upper bound estimate could be as high as 256,000.

In addition, the estimate assumes that the Senate would approve these funds when they consider the bill and that each year the funds would not be cut during the budget process, which may not be case at all. And some of the funds allocated in the bill for the pools still require a state match, which New Jersey may not be able to afford given its dire fiscal condition.

It’s Time for Some Context on ‘Camden’ Job Growth

Posted on April 26, 2017October 10, 2020 by Jon Whiten

On Friday, Congressman Norcross touted new federal statistics “on Camden’s nation-topping employment figures,” while Gov. Christie asserted that “Camden had the nation’s highest percent employment increases [sic] over the past year.”

“Today is another good day for the residents of Camden,” the congressman said. “In the past, Camden was portrayed as crime-ridden, but now it’s job-ridden.”

But a closer look reveals that the facts don’t match the rhetoric tying the job growth to the city of Camden or to New Jersey’s surge in tax breaks in the city: jobs and economic opportunities are still too scarce for Camden city residents.

The job growth being touted was for the Camden metropolitan area that encompasses Burlington, Gloucester and Camden counties, which – at 3.7 percent growth from February 2016 to February 2017 – tied with the Dallas-Plano-Irving metro in Texas for the strongest year-over-year job growth. In all, the Camden metro area added 18,900 jobs during that time and currently has an unemployment rate of 4.8 percent.

Gov. Christie was quick to use the news to highlight the “economic investment and action to promote job creation in Camden” that has been occurring under the state’s runaway corporate tax break program, Grow New Jersey – trying to connect the state’s heavily taxpayer-subsidized and short-sighted economic development strategies to the good employment news.

Any economic growth for New Jersey is news worth celebrating, but it’s also worth noting that the employment situation in the city of Camden is not as promising as in the metro area – and that this surge in tax breaks is overly generous to corporations, bares little teeth when it comes to helping the local economy or growing jobs for Camden city residents, and comes with heavy risk to all New Jersey taxpayers.

In fact, the city of Camden added just 502 jobs during the same 12 months, an increase of 2.1 percent. It’s unemployment rate sits at 9.6 percent, certainly lower than it was when it neared 20 percent during the depths of the recession, but almost identical to the 9.7 percent rate when the recession began in December 2007.

It’s no surprise that the surge in Camden tax breaks – $1.5 billion to 26 companies since December 2013 – has not noticeably improved the job prospects for city residents. First, there’s a natural lag between granting the tax breaks and the time when subsidized projects are completed (the lion’s share have yet to come online). But far more importantly, these projects – by and large – will merely shift jobs that already exist in New Jersey into the city from the surrounding suburbs. Not only will that have a limited impact on Camden’s employment numbers, it’s a seriously flawed approach to economic development.

After all, tax breaks can only do so much to help a distressed city if they aren’t accompanied by public investment in a city’s basic physical, social and economic infrastructure, or by enforceable requirements for corporations to take part in rebuilding a local economy and employing local residents. And the magnitude of the tax breaks to these mostly well-connected corporations clearly puts all New Jersey taxpayers at risk – which, of course, includes the residents and business owners of Camden.

DACA-Eligible New Jerseyans Pay $66 Million a Year in Taxes

Posted on April 25, 2017October 10, 2020 by Erika J Nava

Their tax contributions would drop by 40 percent if DACA protections were rescinded

New Jersey’s young immigrants eligible for DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) contribute $66 million in state and local taxes each year, the seventh highest level of all the states. And those annual contributions would increase by $27 million – the sixth most of all states – under comprehensive immigration reform. Yet they would drop by $21 million if DACA protections were lost. These are the key Garden State findings in a new 50-state study released today by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

Once young immigrants are given a chance, they capitalize on the opportunity – and their tax payments are merely one indicator of these New Jerseyans’ contribution to the state. Providing them, and the rest of the undocumented community, a legal path to citizenship would only strengthen the state’s economy.

Among the ten states with the largest DACA-eligible populations, New Jersey has the lowest application rate – meaning that once the rate picks up, the tax contributions from these young immigrants would rise.

However, the Trump administration has sent mixed signals on whether it intends to honor the DACA executive order in the long term and stories have emerged about DACA recipients being detained and deported.

The report concludes: “If the Trump administration fails to protect this population from deportation, the nation risks forcing them back into the shadows and losing the economic and societal contributions these engaged young people are making in their communities.”

DACA recipients’ state and local tax contributions increase substantially in part because they can legally work and are required to file income taxes using the Social Security number granted by their DACA enrollment. The report notes that employment rates go up for young immigrants receiving DACA protection (from 51 percent to 87 percent), and they experience increased wages.

Since 2013, ITEP has produced regular analyses examining the state and local tax contributions of the nation’s estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants.

Medicaid Cuts Would Jeopardize Health Services for Students

Posted on April 20, 2017October 10, 2020 by Raymond Castro

The Garden State gets fourth highest amount of federal funds for Medicaid services in schools

New Jersey’s schools receive $143 million in federal Medicaid funds each year, the fourth highest of the states, according to data released today by the Washington, DC-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

This funding pays for medical services for Medicaid-eligible students with disabilities, such as mental health and speech therapy. It also covers vision and dental screenings provided in schools to Medicaid-eligible children, and helps schools connect low-income children to other health care services that aren’t provided in schools, but are critical to a child’s development. But this aspect of Medicaid is not widely known, with the program being much better known for providing affordable and comprehensive health care coverage for millions of seniors, people with disabilities and children across the country.

House Republicans’ plans to dramatically cut Medicaid funding puts these crucial services – in addition to health care for nearly half a million New Jerseyans – at risk.

Medicaid funding helps schools pay the salaries of health care and other staff who provide important services to students, not just those with Medicaid coverage. In 2017, 68 percent of school superintendents reported that they used Medicaid funding to keep school nurses, school counselors, speech therapists, and other health professionals on staff. Any cuts to Medicaid could jeopardize the benefits these health care professionals provide.

Medicaid funding cuts also could squeeze New Jersey’s education budget, impeding efforts to help schools implement proven reforms such as hiring and retaining excellent teachers, reducing class sizes, and expanding the availability of high-quality early education — keys to helping all children thrive in school.

All but one of New Jersey’s bipartisan Congressional delegation has publicly opposed this push to repeal the Affordable Care Act and cut Medicaid, because of the harm it’d bring to their constituents. This new data makes it even clearer: policymakers in Washington should protect Medicaid – not cut it.

Nearly 4 Million New Jerseyans Have Pre-Existing Conditions

Posted on April 6, 2017October 10, 2020 by Jon Whiten

While the latest Congressional Republican plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act is apparently dead (at least for the moment) as of yesterday, it has been reported that the proposal would have rolled back protections for the more than 130 million Americans – and 3.8 million New Jerseyans – who have a pre-existing health condition.

These New Jerseyans are found throughout the state, with hundreds of thousands in every Congressional District, according to a new analysis by the Center for American Progress (CAP).

In fact, a slightly higher share of Garden State residents in districts with Republican representatives (52.4 percent) have pre-existing health conditions than residents in districts with Democratic representatives (51.1 percent). And of the 3.8 million New Jerseyans total, nearly half a million (476,800) are children – including my own four-year-old son.

For more on the issue of coverage for Americans with pre-existing conditions, and what’s at risk, see an excerpt of the CAP report below the table.

From the CAP report:

“Republicans are now discussing a provision that is effectively a sick tax on premiums: People with health conditions would be charged multiples more based on their medical history, paying above-standard rates for coverage. Even if the new plan preserved the ACA’s rules on guaranteed issue—meaning that issuers cannot deny coverage—consumers with pre-existing conditions could still be priced out of the market.

Prior to the ACA, insurers could discriminate against consumers based on their current health conditions and medical history. Consumers with common ailments, including asthma and high blood pressure, were charged higher rates. People with histories of serious conditions, such as cancer or heart attacks, were regularly denied coverage altogether.

About half of nonelderly Americans have one or more pre-existing health conditions, according to a recent brief by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, or HHS, that examined the prevalence of conditions that would have resulted in higher rates, condition exclusions, or coverage denials before the ACA. Approximately 130 million nonelderly people have pre-existing conditions nationwide …

Nationally, the most common pre-existing conditions were high blood pressure (44 million people), behavioral health disorders (45 million people), high cholesterol (44 million people), asthma and chronic lung disease (34 million people), and osteoarthritis and other joint disorders (34 million people).

While people with Medicaid or employer-based plans would remain covered regardless of medical history, the repeal of pre-ex protections means that the millions with pre-existing conditions would face higher rates if they ever needed individual market coverage.”

What ITIN Filers Should Know Before Filing Their Taxes

Posted on March 28, 2017October 10, 2020 by Erika J Nava

One of the biggest myths about undocumented immigrants is that they do not pay taxes. In reality, they do – and quite a lot. In New Jersey, undocumented immigrants pay about $587 million a year in state and local taxes, mostly through sales and property taxes – but also through income taxes.

While our undocumented neighbors pay sales or property taxes much in the same way we do – when they purchase a product or pay their rent or mortgage – for income taxes, it’s a bit different. Since they lack the required Social Security number, all undocumented residents who are filing income taxes use what’s called an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN), which is provided by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Starting this tax season, some taxpayers will be required to renew their ITIN number before the IRS can mail them their refund. Here’s why, and what ITIN taxpayers need to know.

Under legislation passed in 2015, ITIN taxpayers who either haven’t filed a tax return for the last three years or who received their ITIN before 2013, are required to renew their numbers. (The latter category is required to renew their ITINs on a rolling schedule – for more details, see the IRS’s explanation.)

It’s estimated that about half of undocumented immigrants use ITIN numbers to file taxes. While precise numbers of total ITIN filer in New Jersey are not available, we do know that there are nearly 4,000 New Jerseyans who have ITIN numbers expiring this tax season; the city and county of Passaic are both home to the highest numbers (368 and 621, respectively).

To renew an ITIN, an undocumented worker must complete and submit the W-7 form and check the “renew an existing ITIN” box. The most important part is to include the documents that prove your identity. The documents must be verified by either presenting them to the IRS national office, having an IRS-certified agent approve them or via an appointment at one of New Jersey’s eight Taxpayer Assistance Centers.

Remember: ITINs can’t be used in place of a Social Security number to work legally in the United States, and can’t be used to apply for public benefits or the Earned Income Tax Credit. What’s more, undocumented immigrants aren’t the only people who use ITINs. Nonresidents who receive taxable income in the U.S., foreign students and dependents of U.S. citizens who don’t have Social Security numbers are among the other types of people who use ITINs.

In today’s hostile climate toward immigrants, there are distinct pros and cons to using an ITIN to file taxes. There are very real and growing concerns that current protections of ITIN holders’ private information could be erased by Congress or the administration. However, filing taxes proves one’s economic presence, establishes a record of one’s work history and demonstrates good moral character by complying with American tax law.

‘ALICE’ Confirms: Many Workers Aren’t Paid Enough to Get By

Posted on March 27, 2017October 10, 2020 by Brandon McKoy

It is no secret that New Jersey is one of the nation’s most expensive states. In fact, only the District of Columbia, Hawaii and New York cost more to cover essential needs like housing, food and transportation. If $100 is the national average of what’s required to meet those needs, the number in New Jersey is $114.50, according to research by the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis. Since a dollar doesn’t stretch as far here in the Garden State as it does nearly everywhere else, it is all the more important for our lawmakers to enact policies that help raise household incomes and increase the amount of money in the pockets of New Jersey residents. Unfortunately, the vast majority of New Jerseyans have seen their pockets steadily lose money for nearly a decade.

Median household income in New Jersey dropped to $72,222 in 2015 from $76,629 in 2007, after adjusting for inflation and the increased cost of basic daily needs, goods and services.

Enter the ALICE Report, which details the alarming financial reality that many New Jersey families experience. ALICE – which stands for Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed – looks at the economic difficulties that residents throughout the state are dealing with and focuses on residents who, as the name describes, are working but have low incomes and limited assets.

According to the updated ALICE report released last November, of the 3.2 million households in New Jersey, 341,000 – about 11 percent – are in poverty, as defined by the Federal Poverty Level of $11,670 for a single adult and $23,850 for a family of four.

But this standard federal definition of poverty doesn’t work when it comes to New Jersey’s poor families. Because of the state’s higher costs, hundreds of thousands of New Jersey Jerseyans with incomes above the federal level are still living in real poverty.

In fact, another 824,000 – an additional 26 percent – qualify as ALICE households, meaning they’re working but not making enough to meet the basic cost of living in the state. In all, more than 1 in 3 – or 37 percent of – New Jersey households are unable to afford basic necessities.

The annual cost for basic necessities for a New Jersey family of four is over $64,000, or two full-time workers each making $16 per hour, according to the ALICE Report. For a single adult, it’s nearly $25,000 – or an hourly wage of $12 for a full-time worker. On average, these costs have increased by 23 percent in the last seven years while wages stayed flat.

With median income at just $72,222 and the cost of basic necessities for a family of four at $64,000, families have hardly anything left to deal with costly emergencies or build up modest savings. As inflation continues to rise and household income remains stagnant, the gap between the cost of necessities and earnings will continue to shrink, with more and more families struggling to make it in New Jersey. If trends remain the same and nothing is done soon, the cost of basic necessities could overcome median income in the years ahead.

For too long Trenton’s answer to this problem has been to reduce taxes for the wealthy and corporations, expecting the prosperity to trickle down to the rest of us. But that hasn’t worked. It never has.

To boost hard-working families and improve the state’s economy, lawmakers need to implement pro-worker policies and tax credits such as raising the minimum wage to a living wage, requiring paid sick leave for all workers, supporting and expanding the earned income tax credit. These policies have stood the test of time with plenty of research showing that they help create a stronger, more productive, more resilient economy.

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