GAO: CMS Should Pay More Attention to States’ Financing of Medicaid

The federal government does not adequately monitor how states finance their Medicaid programs. It also lacks a sufficiently clear understanding of how they pay providers of Medicaid-covered services. These are among the conclusions in a new study on Medicaid financing and payments by the U.S. Government Accountability Office. According to the GAO report, GAO estimated that states’ reliance on provider taxes and local government funds decreased states’ share of net Medicaid payments (total state and federal payments) and effectively increased the federal share of net Medicaid payments by 5 percentage points in state fiscal year 2018.  It also resulted in [...]