No mandate for those left out of Medicaid expansion

Low-income Americans who live in states that have decided not to expand Medicaid eligibility will not face penalties if they fail to buy insurance next year. That's according to a final rule on exemptions to the health law's individual mandate – the law's controversial requirement that most Americans have health coverage or pay a penalty in 2014. That rule was published Wednesday. The health law calls for an expansion of Medicaid, the federal-state insurance program for low-income Americans, by making it available to people up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level, which for individuals is $11,490 in 2013, and providing new federal funding to cover the costs for the first three years, and no less than 90 percent after that.