From: National Center for Policy Analysis
The State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), which covers 6.7 million children and adults, will expire in September. SCHIP consists of 50 different federal-state health plans for children (and in some states adults) in families that earn too much to qualify for Medicaid. Typically, families with incomes above the poverty level, but no more than 200 percent of poverty, are eligible.
The Senate Finance Committee recently voted to reauthorize the program. The Senate bill would expand eligibility to children in families with incomes up to 300 percent of the federal poverty level, or $62,000 for a family of four. House Democrats would raise income limits even higher — to 400 percent of the poverty level ($83,000 for a family of four) — well above the median income.…SCHIP expansion would be costly. The Senate bill would increase spending by $35 billion over five years and the House Democrats would increase spending by more than $50 billion. However, the additional money would mainly buy insurance for children who are already insured. In fact, the families of millions of children currently in SCHIP would have otherwise had private coverage, and most of the children that would be newly eligible already have private coverage. Furthermore, the cost of expansion would be borne by poor families and seniors.
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba589
