This thread is for discussion on state races and ballot measures. Is your state legalizing or banning abortion? Weed? Ranked choice balloting?

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  • @proudblondEnglish
    3•17 days ago

    I’m really curious how Californians feel about Prop 34. It’s kind of bizarre to see a prop that is actively targeting a single organization, even if that org is super sketchy. I felt icky voting on it, for or against.

    • @jordanlundOPM
      1•17 days ago

      Not in CA so not following that… but looking it up:

      https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_34,Require_Certain_Participants_in_Medi-Cal_Rx_Program_to_Spend_98%25_of_Revenues_on_Patient_Care_Initiative(2024)

      “requiring health care providers… to spend 98% of revenues from the federal discount prescription drug program on direct patient care”

      I removed the qualifications to simply boil it down to the ask here… mathematically is this even possible?

      I don’t think any business model survives on 2% overhead.

      https://www.wphealthcarenews.com/understanding-the-complexities-of-overhead-in-a-physician-practice/

      "Most physicians believe that their practice’s overhead is somewhere between 40% and 50% of their charges. The truth is that in today’s medical practices, it is actually between 60% and 70%.

      The reasons? In the past 15 years, health insurance costs for employees rose over 200%. Reimbursements from third-party payers decreased substantially. Technology has become much more expensive. Documentation for malpractice purposes has caused physicians to do more paperwork. The billing process to third-party payers has become much more complicated. Physicians have been forced to hire more staff. With all of these changes, some physicians have taken a 50% cut in pay – or more."

      • @proudblondEnglish
        3•17 days ago

        The thing is, there’s only one org that meets the threshold for it and that’s the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which throws a lot of money at props in California and has some questionable stuff about being a landlord. From calmatters.org:

        Proposition 34 would require some California providers to spend at least 98% of that net drug sale revenue on “direct patient care.” Providers that don’t risk having their state license and tax-exempt status revoked and losing out on government contracts.

        But the proposition doesn’t apply to all providers — only those that spend at least $100 million on expenses other than direct care, that also own and operate apartment buildings and that have racked up at least 500 severe health and safety violations in the last decade.

        As far as anyone can tell, that only applies to one organization: The AIDS Healthcare Foundation. \

        The measure would also put into law a Newsom administration policy that requires all state agencies to negotiate for lower drug prices as a single entity.

        • @jordanlundOPM
          3•17 days ago

          In THAT case, it seems specifically designed to put them out of business… Which I guess would be the basis of the vote…

          You’d think the regulatory agencies would have a better way of dealing with it.

          • @proudblondEnglish
            2•17 days ago

            It’s nuts, right? That’s why it felt icky. My husband and I talk through all the stuff on our ballots together and we really went back and forth on this one. Ultimately we did vote for it, probably because we kept reading that the AHF had funded at least half of all the other props we were voting on, most of which had nothing to do with healthcare. But I’m still not sure that was the right vote. I’ll be curious to see how it shakes out.

            I’m also watching prop 36 because I see all these signs for it in my neighborhood, but I’m against it.