“Schools are closing. Power is being cut off at homes and hospitals. Teachers have to choose between turning on the lights and turning on the computers. Doctors can’t get medicine to treat newborns unless they pay in cash…” This statement made by Barack Obama back in June of 2016 discusses the turmoil that Puerto Rico is currently going through. Puerto Rico is currently experiencing a decline in their economic status and it is affecting not only the common people, but also their healthcare system.

On June 9th, 2016, the US House of Reps passed a legislation piece called the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management and Economic Stability Act, or PROMESA for short. This legislation would help address Puerto Rico’s funds and repayment of the $2 billion of debt. However, this means that the government of the territory will not be in charge of their own decisions. This bill will allow the US to create an oversight board that will have the power to override any decision that the Puerto Rican government wants to make. This includes privatization, commercialization and any financial implications made against workers. Not to mention, if any government officials refuse to abide by the recommendations made by this board, they can be charged of a criminal misdemeanor and could either have any violators be suspended without getting paid, be removed from office, or be imprisoned. The crazy part is that this bipartisan initiative passed with an outstanding majority of 297 to 127. While many of the representatives believe that this will be beneficial to the improvement of the economy for Puerto Rico and that this is the best way to handle the situation, some believe that the oversight board is being granted too much political power.

Some other implications that the initiative itself will pass is the lowering of the minimum wage for a specific age group, even though the poverty rate is already at an alarming high of 45%. Not only that, but it also grants the US government access to privatize thousands of acres in a wildlife refuge so they can sell to private investors. The representatives that were opposed to the passing of this legislation believe that this is leading the US down the road of neocolonialism. The fact that the US is establishing an oversight board to intervene in the government’s policies and saying that it is to benefit them is why many believe that they are simply doing this to have Puerto Rico benefit the US economy.

While much of this legislation is addressing the economic status of Puerto Rico and trying to repair it, it does fail to address one critical aspect and that is the Medicaid cliff. Within the upcoming months, the island could experience a reduction in spending on Medicaid by about 75%. Just recently, the governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rosselló Nevares, reached out to the Florida government and asked if they could act as a voice of reasoning in Congressional approval of trying to implement a new way to deal with the drastic upcoming of the Medicaid cliff. He also notified them that this could affect their economic budget and could increase their taxes by $2.5 billion if many of the Puerto Rican citizens decide to relocate to Florida and apply for Medicaid. A few days later, he spoke to a group on Capitol Hill regarding the dire urgency of dealing with the cliff.

Being a territory of the United States, the detrimental state of Puerto Rico could highly impact the standing of our own nation. With the falling stability of the island, many of their citizens will want to immigrate to the United States in order to apply for a better healthcare system, even though our healthcare system is also going to become “revamped” as a result of the Trump administration wanting to repeal the Affordable Care Act established by the Obama administration. Coming into the US, they will most likely move into large cities in places like New York, Florida and other states across the nation. This will, as a result, cause the taxpayers of the respective cities to have to make up this money within the upcoming decades. If this issue is to not be resolved by the US Congress within the upcoming months, this will result in a large spike in poverty all throughout the island and a decrease in the economic status of the United States.

Being the mother country of Puerto Rico, it would be in our best interest to find a way to help bring the economy of the island back to a sustainable level. While this bipartisan legislative would help in some ways, the flaws within them would outweigh the implications in the long run. Finding the right balance between aiding the island and allowing the Puerto Rican government to make the right decisions for themselves at points would benefit us all. In the end, while we do live in different parts of the world, we are all still human beings and as humans, it is our obligation to make sure that others are not suffering and to find a way to come together to help out those people in times of need.

 

Sources:

http://www.caribbeannewsnow.com/topstory-Puerto-Rico-officials-urge-congress-to-take-immediate-action-to-avoid-%27Medicaid-cliff%27-33874.html

http://www.caribbeannewsnow.com/topstory-Puerto-Rico-governor-seeks-Florida%27s-assistance-in-addressing-healthcare-crisis-33850.html

http://www.caribbeannewsnow.com/headline-Commentary%3A-PROMESA%3A-The-Puerto-Rican-debt-crisis-and-its-restructuring-30851.html