Missouri July Benefits Report
Well, a few more Missouri citizens received food stamps last month and even without Medicaid Expansion better than a million received state-provided health care.
Still, compared to other states the struggling people of the Show Me State get cheated on federally-funded basic benefits.
Without further delay, here are the highlights of the July 2021 Missouri Department of Socials Services Monthly Management Report for the Family Support Division and MO HealthNet Division…
Missouri Benefits
July 2021 July 2020 July 2016 July 2015
Temporary Assistance
Total Persons 14,694 23,583 33,923 69,556
Per Family $221.19 $238.33 $225.20 $224.73
Per Day $ 7.14 $ 7.69 $ 7.26 $ 7.25
Food Stamps [SNAP]
Participants 698,864 777,885 778,698 846,529
Per Person $228.87 $173.38 $120.84 $123.50
Per Person / Meal $ 2.46 $ 1.86 $ 1.30 $ 1.33
MO HealthNet [Medicaid]
Enrolled 1,098,103 957,820 979,102 950,077
Covered 1,104,425 945,883 1,043,974 967,277
Per Patient $898.99 $949.51 $741.42 $674.87
Managed Care $265.88 $281.17 $233.64 $209.46
mo.dss.gov/re
History class: in 2015 the Missouri legislature enacted strict and nasty time limits and restrictions on Temporary Assistance. Now, see if this sounds familiar. Republicans justified the cuts by claiming that too many people were living too well on government benefits. Cutting benefits will force them into the work force and off the $7.25 per family per day Easy Street.
This July’s food stamp participant total is 10.2% below 7/20. In most of these United States food stamp participation is up around 12% this year, meaning that Missouri is actually lagging by about 22%. In other words, if we were average we’d have at least 850,000 on food stamps. Based on our below average median household income, 925,000 SNAP recipients ought to be expected. Of course, Missouri strives for the bottom. We look up [down?] at average.
Better than one in six Missourians received their medical care from MO HealthNet last month. With expansion, that will jump to one in five…wait that can’t be right, can it? If we add the expected 275,000 people to the rolls that gets Missouri to 1,373,000 on Medicaid, or, about 22% of the 6,154,913 people the census found in Missouri. [ https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/MO ]
So, despite all the noise, the bottom line is that Medicaid Expansion means 4% more of our citizen neighbors will have reliable access to health care – and Uncle Sam pays 90% of the bump!
Whoops, I forgot. His Accidency remains convinced that letting people eat and go to a doctor demeans them, just like “giving” money to the unemployed and families with young kids attacks their dignity. Polk County morality.
Glenn