The poor CMA apparently can’t get it right. It finally gets a quasi-universal insurance bill passed in California that should reduce the number of uninsured showing up at the doctor’s office and yet a bunch of its members (like the LA and San Diego Medical Societies) have noticed that they might have to buy insurance for their employees when the bill becomes law.  So of course the squawking has begun. 

But the math skills of the southern Cal docs may be lacking. Lets say that 25% of their patients are uninsured (which is about the ratio down there). Presumably if that number fell dramamtically, many of the uninsured they are treating will now be insured, and so will be paying so revenues will go up–presumably by up to 25%.  Costs may rise as the office staff need insurance, but insurance does not cost more than 10-12% of payroll. So they should come out ahead. 

And of course if they bothered to read the fine print they might notice that SB2 doesn’t apply to employers with less than 50 employees, and not many solo or small group practices have that many.