Louisiana
How a Louisiana budget whiz and small business owner sees Congress’ fight over health care
WASHINGTON – When state Rep. Jack McFarland, R-Winnfield, isn’t mulling complex finances as chair of the Louisiana House Appropriations Committee, he runs a logging contractor firm in Winn Parish.
As a small businessman with about 20 employees, McFarland frets about the lack of action on health care. Time is of the essence, and McFarland wants the warring parties in Washington to figure out a solution.
Republicans want to overhaul the Affordable Care Act to lower health care costs and increase consumer choice. Democrats are not opposed to fixes but argue that will take too much time, so first, the enhanced ACA marketplace subsidies need to be continued before expiring.
About 24.3 million working Americans and small businesses — 292,994 in Louisiana — will see their monthly costs double, on average, starting Jan. 1 if the subsidies are not extended. Disagreement on extending the tax credits was at the center of the government shutdown.
An ardent conservative in a parish that gave 88% of its votes to U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Benton, McFarland agrees that substantial changes are necessary.
For instance, his employees can’t access the ACA marketplace.
Despite the promise in 2010 that the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, to lower health insurance premiums, it did not. The policy McFarland provided employees went from about $37,000 annually in 2011 to about $132,000 in 2024.
McFarland said his company had to stop covering premiums for his employees and now just pays a little to help. When some of his workers wanted to lower their costs by shifting to the ACA marketplace, they could not because his company offered health insurance, he said.
“As an employer, I would have to stop offering health insurance to all my employees for them to be eligible for subsidies,” McFarland said, adding that now many of his employees have no insurance.
Like most things that deal with health care and insurance, the Affordable Care Act is complex, with a lot of moving parts.
Obamacare protected people with preexisting conditions and made insurance available for those who couldn’t afford it. But the promise that premiums would decline because more people had insurance didn’t materialize.
Premium costs have risen from an average $177 per month in 2010 for individual policies, like the ones the ACA marketplace sells, to $467 per month in 2024, according to KFF, a Washington-based health analysis organization. Monthly costs for group insurance, like those offered by employers and cover roughly 170 million people, went up from an average $273 per month to $512 per month during the same period.
Senate Republicans are looking at various alternatives that align with President Donald Trump’s demand last week that the ACA subsidies go “directly to the people” rather than insurance companies.
In the House, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, told reporters Tuesday that House committee leaders also are looking at various ideas.
“We’re not here to bail out insurance companies,” he said. “We’re here to give families lower premiums and better options.”
But in both chambers, Democrats and Republicans are not talking officially to each other.
The Senate will need 60 votes to pass any GOP measure, which means seven Democrats have to sign on to any package that all the Republicans support — or eight Republicans have to agree with all the Democrats backing one of their ideas.
Right now, neither scenario looks likely when it comes to the key issue of whether to extend the enhanced ACA marketplace tax credits, which will get a vote in mid-December.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, said Thursday on the Senate floor that Republican ideas are “half-baked.”
“They are deeply flawed and woefully insufficient for our nation’s health care problems,” Schumer said. “When people’s monthly payments spike next year, they’ll know it was Republicans that made it happen.”
On Thursday, Johnson refined his oft-repeated accusation that Democrats only care about “illegal aliens” to point out what California, Illinois and Oregon spent more on health care for “noncitizens” than for police and roads.
Immigrants who slipped into the country without authorization are not legally allowed to take advantage of Obamacare. Legal immigrants who have jobs and children regardless of their status are allowed to buy insurance through ACA marketplaces. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that about 1.4 million immigrants have.
“Everybody’s just went to their corner and they’re just not coming out,” McFarland said. “It’s a broken system that needs to be fixed, not patched, for the people and for small businesses. They need to sit down and figure this out.”
Louisiana ranks among the top 10 most affordable states to retire, according to a new study from Retirement Living, a national journal of retirement research.
Researchers analyzed each state’s housing costs, living expenses and tax friendliness to compile the ranking. Louisiana, they say, is the eighth most affordable state for retirees.
In Louisiana, the median monthly rent for a one-bedroom apartment is $932, the median home sale price is $255,000, monthly grocery spend per capita is $272, the average price per gallon of regular gas is $4, the average Medicare Advantage monthly premium is $13.35 and the average effective property tax rate is 0.55%.
West Virginia is the most affordable state to retire, followed by Mississippi, Alabama, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Louisiana, Indiana and Kansas. Researchers describe the South as “the sweet spot for an affordable retirement.”
The most expensive state to retire, meanwhile, is California, followed by Hawaii, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Utah, New York and Minnesota.
Read Retirement Living’s full report here.
BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – With hurricane season approaching, the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority is bringing the community together to prepare before a storm forms.
“We can’t stop disasters from happening. We can’t stop hurricanes from happening. But what we can do is equip our communities with the resources that they need to prepare for these storms ahead of time,” said Jayda Morris, CPRA outreach manager.
The agency hosted an event featuring interactive storm simulations and a full model of the Mississippi River.
“If you do it now, like on a sunny day like today, you’re ready to go for the rest of the season,” Jay Grymes said.
El Niño may reduce storms, but Louisiana still at risk
State Climatologist Jay Grymes said an El Niño pattern may reduce the number of storms in the Atlantic but warned against a false sense of security.
“In those 25 years, Louisiana, some part of the state has been impacted by 29 storms. That’s one a year, regardless of El Niño. So that should tell you something,” Grymes said.
He said the bigger concern is storms that can form in the Gulf with little warning.
“If we’re going to get a storm, it very possibly could be one that bubbles up in the Gulf and doesn’t give us five or seven days to track it coming our way. It gives us 40 hours to get ready for a landfall. So it’s imperative that you go ahead and do it now,” Grymes said.
Preparation goes beyond stocking water
Preparing now includes walking through yards, checking trees, and knowing whether everyone in the family can survive two weeks without power.
PhD students with the LSU College of the Coast and Environment gave the community a virtual reality experience that puts users inside a storm.
“If they wear the goggles or play with the Apple Vision Pro, they can understand how high will the flood be, and they can know how dangerous is the hurricane scenario,” said Yixuan Wang.
The VR simulation uses real historical data to show users what compound flooding looks like in New Orleans and surrounding areas. The goal is to make the science real for people who can’t picture what a flood map means.
“It’s just to let you understand the environment. We will add the audios, the different sound of the wind and the storm. And you can see how tense of the rainfall around you,” Wang said.
Organizers said the event is about making sure that when a storm threatens the area, families already know their plan.
Information from the event is available on CPRA’s website. Hurricane season runs through Nov. 30.
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BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – Louisiana homeowners can get financial help to upgrade their roofs and ensure they can better stand up to strong storms.
According to the Louisiana Department of Insurance, registration for next Louisiana Fortify Homes Program lottery opens at 8 a.m. on Monday, June 1. The registration period will stay open through 5 p.m. on Friday, June 19.
Under the latest round of the program, 3,000 grants of up to $10,000 will go out. After applying, homeowners will get placed into a lottery and will be randomly selected.
There are many specific benefits of having a roof upgraded through the Louisiana Fortify Homes Program. Officials said the roofs have stronger shingles that can protect against hail up to two inches wide, sealed roof decks to help prevent water damage, and stronger edges to keep wind from getting underneath.
Homeowners with a fortified roof can also get a certificate to receive a discount on insurance premiums.
“At the end of the day, this program is about more than just roofs,” said Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple. “It is about protecting families, it is about strengthening communities, and it is about putting Louisiana in a stronger position—both physically and economically—to face the challenges ahead.”
Only people living in Ascension Parish, Livingston Parish, Assumption Parish, Tangipahoa Parish, Acadia Parish, Calcasieu Parish, Cameron Parish, Iberia Parish, Jefferson Parish, Jefferson Davis Parish, Lafayette Parish, Lafourche Parish, Orleans Parish, Plaquemines Parish, St. Bernard Parish, St. Charles Parish, St. James Parish, St. John the Baptist Parish, St. Martin Parish, St. Mary Parish, St. Tammany Parish, Terrebonne Parish, and Vermilion Parish are eligible to apply for the latest round of the program.
People living in a newly built home, mobile home, or condominium are not qualified.
For a detailed list of eligibility requirements, click here.
If a person registered for the program previously, he or she must do so again. The person will also need to provide the following information:
- A homestead exemption on the primary residence.
- A policy of insurance that provides wind coverage for the primary residence.
- A flood insurance policy on the primary residence if it is in a special flood hazard area.
For more information about applying, click here.
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