Medicare and Medicaid: RIP (Washington's solution to failing programs is to enlarge them)

American Thinker ^ | 08/14/2012 | Deane Waldman

[SeekAndFind]

What does Washington do when one of its programs fails? Answer: enlarge it!

First, there is Medicare. That program will go broke by 2017. So what did Nancy Pelosi want to do? Answer: expand it to include all Americans. Meanwhile, seniors cannot find a doctor who will accept them if they have Medicare coverage. Why? Because Medicare pays so little to providers that they lose money every time they take care of a Medicare patient. For icing on that cake, the ACA -- Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act of 2010 -- will cut Medicare reimbursements even further: an additional 21-27%. How does Congress think that doctors who cannot pay their staff will still be able to practice medicine?

Now, the push is to expand Medicaid. Washington pushing the states to expand their programs by increasing Medicaid eligibility standards: age limit up from 18 to 26 years, income up to 400% of poverty line, and adding more categories of illness. The costs of such an expansion are massive.

The income threshold change alone makes a family of four earning $88,000 per year eligible for Medicaid subsidy. That encompasses 79% of the entire country!

But wait. Washington promises to cover these costs fully. A naïve, well-meaning physician publicly supported Medicaid expansion, calling it the "deal of the decade" and good for patients (Albuquerque Journal, July 22, 2012).

An uncritical, superficial analysis (that also ignores history) might agree. According to the New Mexico Legislative Finance Committee, adding 212,000 people to the Medicaid lists by 2020 would, in theory, bring in an additional 3.5 billion "free" (federal) dollars. That sum represents a 60% increase over the entire 2012 annual New Mexico State budget of $5.6 billion.

[SeekAndFind]

[G]overnment's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases:

If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

-- Ronald Reagan, State of the Union Address, February 4, 1986

[freekitty]

Enlarge it so they can steal more money

[Graybeard58]

My doctor's solution to Medicare's niggardly payment plan is to raise the rates of his non medicare patients.

I'm on Medicare and my wife is not. He charges her $150 per 5 minute office call, calling it an "extended visit" all of which she pays, (all office calls are billed as "extended visits"). He charges me the same but Medicare will only pay on $120, I pay 20% of that, by law, he cannot charge me for what Medicare does not pay.

His rates 1 year ago were $92 per visit.

[Graybeard58]

P.S. on reply #3.

I have high blood pressure and in order to get my prescription refilled, he requires that I see him every 3 months. My wife has high blood pressure, diabetes and 3 fairly serious surgeries in the past 3 years, her visits average every 3 months or less.

[Graybeard58]

On the other hand, my Dentist’s charges have risen very little in the past 10 years. No Medicare there.

I’ll quit posting here now.