EN
TABOR might promise a government on a diet and fatter refund checks, but Colorado’s wallet feels the pinch. It’s one of the tightest tax laws in the country, quietly deciding what our state can and can’t afford. If this makes you scratch your head or mutter, “Wait, that’s fishy…” you’re in good company.
April 11, 2025
….Colorado can’t keep up with rising health care costs—and families are paying the price?
Cost to Families: When provider rates don’t keep up with inflation, it leads to longer drives, longer wait times, and delayed care, especially in rural areas where clinics may stop accepting Medicaid or shut down altogether. For Coloradans with public insurance like Medicaid, it’s already much harder to get an appointment: they’re 1.6 times less likely to secure primary care and 3.3 times less likely to get a specialist visit compared to those with private insurance. Transportation adds another barrier — only 2.1 percent of privately insured Coloradans report transportation challenges, but that jumps to 8.4 percent for those on public insurance and even higher in rural parts of the state. The bottom line: TABOR-driven health care cuts don’t save money — they shift the burden onto families who are left waiting, driving, or going without the care they need.
Long-Term Costs: TABOR-driven cuts to health care don’t just hurt families — they drain Colorado’s economy. Hospitals, especially in rural areas like Alamosa and La Jara, depend on Medicaid to stay open. When Medicaid funding is cut, hospitals are forced to reduce services or close, driving job loss and slashing wages for home health care workers. Underpaying Medicaid providers also creates workforce shortages, especially in nursing homes and behavioral health, where wages can’t keep up with inflation. While Colorado has made some efforts to increase Medicaid rates over the past five years, the rate of growth is not matching cost increases or workforce needs, especially in behavioral health and long-term care.
