Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2021

Abstract

In a first for the Medicaid program, the Department of Health and Human Services under President Trump allowed states to establish work requirements for program participants who are considered "able-bodied adults." These mandates were halted by litigation, and President Biden's administration is now in the process of withdrawing the waivers. But early experiences with Medicaid work requirements suggested that they can produce widespread losses of benefits. In addition to affecting access, work requirements and other conditions on public benefits can serve an expressive purpose: they provide a source of information about a state's values, goals, and beliefs about beneficiaries. Beneficiaries are one audience for this expressive message, but we know little about what they hear when their state makes benefits more difficult to access.

This Article presents an original empirical study of more than 9,000 Medicaid beneficiaries in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, the first state approved for a work requirement program. Using a mix of survey data and qualitative interviews, this Article demonstrates that Medicaid beneficiaries understand work requirements as providing information about the state's values and priorities. But depending on their priors, beneficiaries interpreted these messages very differently. Many found work requirements unfair and expressive of disregard toward themselves and other beneficiaries; others believed, however, that the state had validated their identities as taxpayers.

This Article presents these findings and considers implications for expressive theories of law, shifting the paradigm to emphasize that the expressive impacts of law will depend on who is listening.

Disciplines

Health Law and Policy | Law | Law and Race

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