Stop messing around with Medicare

OK, I am back from my reading assignment. Whew

www.economics21.org/commentary/the crass distortion of paul ryans social security proposals

"The top 10 stories from this year’s Trustees’ Reports: Without getting into the specific numbers, the list below is an attempt to assess what are likely to be the biggest stories arising from the reports.

1. Medicare HI insolvency five years earlier than projected last year (2029 to 2024). Though HI is but one part of Medicare, and the insolvency date is of limited meaning as explained above, the 5-year acceleration is a big story.
2. Disability Insurance Trust Fund insolvent in 2018. Again, the insolvency date is not the only important factor. It will rightly draw attention, however, that the DI fund would be exhausted relatively soon.
3. Expressed skepticism about the Medicare projections. Throughout the Trustees’ Medicare report, multiple reasons are given why actual costs are likely to be higher than shown.
4. Permanent cash deficits in Social Security. This year’s report indicates that the cash shortfalls that began in Social Security in 2010 will be permanent.
5. Significant worsening of Social Security’s long-term imbalance. The good news is that we are living longer than previously projected. The bad news is the largest single-year deterioration in Social Security’s long-term balance since the 1994 report.
6. The shortfall is certain. From the Summary: “A supplementary analysis that allows plausible random variations from the intermediate assumptions employed in the report indicates that OASDI trust fund exhaustion is highly probable. . .” (more than 97.5% probable by mid-century).
7. Action needed soon to protect the most vulnerable. From the All-Trustees’ message: “The long-run financial challenges facing Social Security and Medicare should be addressed soon. . . . Earlier action will also afford elected officials with a greater opportunity to minimize adverse impacts on vulnerable populations, including lower-income workers and those who are already substantially dependent on program benefits.”
8. Cost growth is driven by population aging, and the critical time is from now through 2035. From the Public Trustees’ message: “Under current law, demographic trends will be the primary driver of cost growth for both Social Security and Medicare over the next couple of decades. . . . More than 90 percent of combined cost growth in Social Security and Medicare from 2007 through 2085 relative to GDP will have occurred by 2035 under current projections.”
9. These are problems both for the programs themselves and for the larger budget. From the Public Trustees’ Message: “Whether viewed from the narrower trust fund perspective or from the wider unified budget perspective, the financial challenges confronting both programs must be addressed.”
10. Costs of delay are probably understated. From the Public Trustees’ Message: “In the past, policy makers have been reluctant to significantly reduce the benefits of those who have already begun to collect them. In a practical sense, therefore, changes adversely affecting younger generations are likely to be much more severe than indicated in these simple illustrations. The costs that will be borne by younger generations will grow significantly each year that a new cohort of baby boomers joins the benefit rolls.”

So like I said, social needs are requirements, not an option. Providing for the common defense is also a requirement, and not an option. We're spending vastly more on both than most of our competitors, so something is way out of whack.

It's not what we're doing but how we're doing it. And those who are ridiculing anyone who proposes changing how we accomplish the same thing are the ones keeping us in harness to a nationally debilitating methodology. Not just with health services. Include how we are going to answer 40+ million unemployed, border security, the national debt and a whole host of issues that are currently being ignored and are adding to government expenditure. There is no way we are going to spend our way out of this financial imbalance, and those who are demanding "government" do more for them, need to step back and take a look at the economic reality facing the nation. Obama is our current leader and he's not leading. He's maintaining a partisan social agenda in the face of a serious economic crisis and refusing to work with or acknowledge that the other side just might have reasonable input. Of course the media is not helpful here either. Misrepresenting to suit their bias.

 Everyone ASSUMES that if Americans are given more medical care, they are better off when the opposite is true. Less medical care is better. Hospitals are bacteria-spreading centers. Most doctors are GUESSING and filling you with drugs that are worse than your disease.  The only reason we need doctors is for severe trauma cases from car accidents or gunshots or for setting broken bones or cutting out tumors, etc.  So, if the Obummercare is ended along with Medicare, folks will live a LOT longer.    Also, if all insurance is eliminated, you can count on it -- medical prices will fall. The artificially high prices it engenders will plummet to affordable levels. We don't need all those CYA catscans and MRIs, etc.