Posted on 09/11/2009 8:00:40 PM PDT by GoldStandard
For many years, a handful of American political leaders -- including the late senator Ted Kennedy and now President Obama -- have been trying to gain passage of comprehensive health care for all Americans. As far back as President Harry S. Truman, they have urged Congress to act on this national need. In a presentation before a joint session of Congress last week, Obama offered his view of the best way forward.
But what seems missing in the current battle is a single proposal that everyone can understand and that does not lend itself to demagoguery. If we want comprehensive health care for all our citizens, we can achieve it with a single sentence: Congress hereby extends Medicare to all Americans.
Those of us over 65 have been enjoying this program for years. I go to the doctor or hospital of my choice, and my taxes pay all the bills. It's wonderful. But I would have appreciated it even more if my wife and children and I had had such health-care coverage when we were younger. I want every American, from birth to death, to get the kind of health care I now receive. Removing the payments now going to the insurance corporations would considerably offset the tax increase necessary to cover all Americans.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
and I want a new pony too.
Has nobody told this simple old cadaver George McGovern that medicare is due to go bankrupt around 2017? That’s only 8 years from now. There’s no scumbag worse than an old scumbag.
TEDDY KEGGER went OUt of STATE to get his Medical CARE. I GUESS MA’s ROMNEYCARE isn’t good enough for old KEGGER.
That is simple. How about social security for all? Why should any of us work? We can jsut buy everything imported and hire illegals.
Well, that’s something to think about. Unfortunately Medicare is going broke. But, if you think about it, a bureaucracy is already in place to administer Medicare. We would still need big tax increases to pay for it all, if instead of the “public option”, anyone could just sign up for Medicare.
Psssst!!! WaPo!
Medicare is going broke faster than you!
Medicare pays 65 cents on the dollar. It can do that because everyone else picks up the other 35 cents. It is called cost shifting. If everyone has Medicare, who pays the rest? Answer: no one. We ration.
That is pretty simple.
Let’s see. In 2006 (the most recent year I have data on) we budgeted $345B for Medicare. Add to that the premiums paid by individuals, and the copays they paid at the time of service.
Divide that number by the number of persons receiving Medicare. Then weight that number down by some value less than 1 (say .5) to reflect the fact that the present Medicare population is made up of elderly who are higher than average consumer of healthcare (as opposed to those less than 35).
Now multiply by 304 million. That’s the annual cost of Medicare for everyone.
Oh, yeah, then inflate by the difference in medical costs relative to 2006.
“and my taxes pay all the bills”
And that’s a lie.
Other peoples taxes pay your bills.
Its the old something for nothing. Of course it is “wonderful” for you. It isn’t so wonderful for everyone else paying your bills.
It is pyramid scheme that depends on the base being ever larger than those above the base who are on the receiving end. And the simple fact of the matter is the base is shrinking relative to the those on the receiving end.
Stupid idea.
Instead we need to abolish Medicare.
Perfectly summarized in seven words. :)
I’ve always wondered why this hasn’t been proposed.
"Medicare's financial status is much worse. As was true in 2008, Medicare's Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund is expected to pay out more in hospital benefits and other expenditures this year than it receives in taxes and other dedicated revenues. The difference will be made up by redeeming trust fund assets. Growing annual deficits are projected to exhaust HI reserves in 2017, after which the percentage of scheduled benefits payable from tax income would decline from 81 percent in 2017 to about 50 percent in 2035 and 30 percent in 2080. In addition, the Medicare Supplementary Medical Insurance (SMI) Trust Fund that pays for physician services and the prescription drug benefit will continue to require general revenue financing and charges on beneficiaries that grow substantially faster than the economy and beneficiary incomes over time."
"As we reported last year, Medicare's financial difficulties come sooner—and are much more severe—than those confronting Social Security. While both programs face demographic challenges, rapidly growing health care costs also affect Medicare. Underlying health care costs per enrollee are projected to rise faster than the earnings per worker on which payroll taxes and Social Security benefits are based. As a result, while Medicare's annual costs were 3.2 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2008, or about three quarters of Social Security's, they are projected to surpass Social Security expenditures in 2028 and reach 11.4 percent of GDP in 2083.
"The projected exhaustion of the HI Trust Fund within the next eight years is an urgent concern. Congressional action will be necessary to ensure uninterrupted provision of HI services to beneficiaries. Correcting the financial imbalance for the HI Trust Fund—even in the short range alone—will require substantial changes to program income and/or expenditures.
Part B of the Supplementary Medical Insurance (SMI) Trust Fund, which pays doctors' bills and other outpatient expenses, and Part D, which pays for access to prescription drug coverage, are both projected to remain adequately financed into the indefinite future because current law automatically provides financing each year to meet next year's expected costs. However, expected steep cost increases will result in rapidly growing general revenue financing needs-projected to rise from 1.3 percent of GDP in 2008 to about 4.7 percent in 2083-as well as substantial increases over time in beneficiary premium charges."
It is expected that about one quarter of Part B enrollees will be subject to unusually large premium increases in the next two years. This occurs because it is projected that the other three-quarters of Part B enrollees will not be subject to premium increases in those years due to low projected Social Security benefit COLAs and a "hold-harmless" provision of current law that limits premium increases to the increase in Social Security benefits.
"This year's Medicare Trustees Report is the fourth consecutive report in which the annual general revenue funding contribution to total Medicare expenditures is projected to exceed 45 percent within the first seven years of the 75-year projection period. The current projection is that the threshold will be reached in 2014, the same as reported last year. This result triggers another "Medicare funding warning."
Another Communist !
Here's an idea, read one of the several dozen proposals republicans have presented in the past 12 years before you argue that it’s all a matter of what they call the pig. Remember never let a good crisis go to waste? If they don't pass Obamacare, they're going to add death panels and limitations to Medicare. Control is their goal, get it? What you want for your children doesn't matter to them any more than do 4000 abortions a day or your grandma. You should start worrying about whether your children will grow up as citizens or slaves, not about why they don’t have cradle to grave taxpayer funded medical care.
have a nice day
Yeah, a fed entitlement now spending well over 1000% of it original promise, going broke, with an admitted $500 billion in fraud and waste. Let’s extend it to everyone. That will work. Yeah, that’s the ticket!
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