[Bob Ireland]

***Medicare Part A has been running in the red since 2008***

Medicare Part A has been in the red from day one: there are NO premiums for Part A.

[kabar]

LOL. Where do you think the HI portion of the payroll taxes go?

[kabar]

The Trustees project that the Medicare Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund will be the next to face depletion after the DI Trust Fund. The projected date of HI Trust Fund depletion is 2026, two years later than projected in last year’s report, at which time dedicated revenues would be sufficient to pay 87 percent of HI cost. The Trustees project that the share of HI cost that can be financed with HI dedicated revenues will decline slowly to 71 percent in 2047, and then rise slowly until it reaches 73 percent in 2087. As it has since 2008, the HI Trust Fund will pay out more in hospital benefits and other expenditures than it receives in income in all years until reserve depletion.

Medicare is the nation’s health insurance program for persons age 65 and older and certain disabled persons. Medicare consists of four distinct parts: Part A (Hospital Insurance, or HI); Part B (Supplementary Medical Insurance, or SM I); Part C (Medicare Advantage, or MA); and Part D (the outpatient prescription drug benefit). The Part A program is financed primarily through payroll taxes levied on current workers and their employers; these are credited to the HI trust fund.