Some disabled people want to advance their careers. They say Medicaid rules stop them
A finance manager with a disability faces the potential loss of Medicaid benefits due to strict income limits and new federal work requirements. The article highlights the tension between career advancement and the loss of essential healthcare support for disabled individuals.
Why it matters
It illustrates the 'benefits cliff' where economic success for disabled workers can paradoxically lead to the loss of critical medical coverage.
Erica Carter is passionate about her job, and she has 7 acres of flowers and vegetables to show for it.
Carter's specialty is reeling in grants to support students in the Omaha Nation school district, where she is a finance manager. One paid for the garden that sits next to the district's campus. Another allowed the school system, in one of Nebraska's lowest-income counties, to pay students to maintain it.
This story was produced in partnership with KFF Health News .
"They're out in the sun. They're watering plants," she said. "It's the first time they get a paycheck in their life."
Carter, 41, is paralyzed from the chest down, an injury she's lived with since a fall in her early 20s. It didn't slow her down as she built her accounting career and got a master's degree in human resource management.
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