Posted on 08/09/2009 7:46:14 PM PDT by smartyaz
..Please sit tight while I walk you through the math of Medicare. As you may know, the program comes in three parts: Medicare Part A, which covers hospital stays; Medicare B, which covers doctor visits; and Medicare D, the drug benefit that went into effect just 29 months ago. The infinite-horizon present discounted value of the unfunded liability for Medicare A is $34.4 trillion. The unfunded liability of Medicare B is an additional $34 trillion. The shortfall for Medicare D adds another $17.2 trillion. The total? If you wanted to cover the unfunded liability of all three programs today, you would be stuck with an $85.6 trillion bill.. .. It is more than six times the annual output of the entire U.S. economy.
Let’s say ...every U.S. citizen who is alive today decided to fully address this unfunded liability through lump-sum payments from our own pocketbooks, so that all of us and all future generations could be secure in the knowledge that we and they would receive promised benefits in perpetuity. How much would we have to pay if we split the tab? Again, the math is painful. With a total population of 304 million, from infants to the elderly, the per-person payment to the federal treasury would come to $330,000. This comes to $1.3 million per family of four—over 25 times the average household’s income.
..I hope that gives you some idea of just how large the problem is. ... Discretionary spending would have to be reduced by 97 percent not only for our generation, but for our children and their children and every generation of children to come. And similarly on the taxation side, income tax revenue would have to rise 68 percent and remain that high forever. Remember, though, I said tax revenue, not tax ratest?
...
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasfed.org ...
Wow, is it unusual for a member of the Fed to speak so frankly?
I did the math on this a few weeks ago. It could be as high as $555,000 per working person.
parsy, who thinks we are screwed
At 51 I ain’t gonna be able to pay their bill. As a couple, my DH and I, MAY have made that in our lifetimes up ‘til now. Doubt it.
maddie, who agrees with Parsy.
Bump!
Yes it is. “You might wonder why a central banker would be concerned with fiscal matters. Fiscal policy is, after all, the responsibility of the Congress, not the Federal Reserve. Congress, and Congress alone, has the power to tax and spend. From this monetary policymaker’s point of view, though, deficits matter for what we do at the Fed. There are many reasons why. Economists have found that structural deficits raise long-run interest rates, complicating the Fed’s dual mandate to develop a monetary policy that promotes sustainable, noninflationary growth. The even more disturbing dark and dirty secret about deficits—especially when they careen out of control—is that they create political pressure on central bankers to adopt looser monetary policy down the road. I will return to that shortly. First, let me give you the unvarnished facts of our nation’s fiscal predicament.”
The Rats are now talking about a more incremental approach.
I’ll pay my share. Just take it out of my next stock dividend check from General Motors and call it even.
Thanks for the update, this speech was given over a year ago.
I kinda think what we have to do is print money, pay the whole countries debts off to everybody, and start over with a Basic Income Grant for the whole country each month, and let people work for extra if they want to.
parsy, who thinks hat he shall never see,
a better way to get debt free
Dont worry, Obama will just sign into law a minimum wage increase to $300/ hour-—problem solved. This governing thing is just so easy.
We should shift focus for tea parties to include teach ins at college campuses, to show students that Democrats want nothing more than to create generations of debt slaves.
Oh, don’t say bad things about minwages. You’ll get me all stirred up just at bedtime.
parsy, who is sipping S.Pelligrino sparkling mineral water and chilling down
Republican/GWB socialized medicine ping!
Here’s how it happened, from an ex-GOP’er for 30 years. It is the perception that the GOP is th party of the rich and doesn’t give a crap about the average working man. Sadly, the GOP has lost its soul to the anarcho-capitalists, the rich, Wall Street, and big business.
parsy, who has just gotten comfy in his Spiderman pj’s
Bush’s second term was a miserable failure.
I’m glad he’s gone, but I’m not happy that Obama was his replacement.
Analogy attempt (on the difference between an unfunded mandate and an unpaid loan)
I promise my 6 year-old grandson that I will buy him a $5 million home when he turns 18. I sign the paperwork, legally obligating me. He spends his youth musing how wealthy he is, the owner of a $5M obligation. As he enters high school, I start to feel poor, because I know I cannot pay.
At some point, reality hits, and the kid realizes he doesn’t have a valuable asset and he is poor. He sues, everyone knowing he won’t get the full $5M, but will get much more than I can afford.
So, the $85 trillion is not a real asset, seniors and boomers are poor .... and the political chaos will be beyond the pale.
The euthanasia propaganda will go into overdrive soon.
cPete, who wonders when the SCOTUS will recognize a “constitutional right to suicide” under the “privacy” doctrine ...
I understand they can default on unfunded stuff, but who is going to ell old folks there is no SS? And how do you take care of the poor old folks? And the sick and disabled? And the unemployed? And all of this on the backs of fewer workers/recipient.
parsy, who has been studying and found out poems have feet
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