[Wphile]

SS taxes are 12.4%; Medicare 2.9% for a combined total of 15.3%. There are limits on Social Security income, which are raised periodically - about every two years it seems. For Medicare there is no limit.

The focus of this article is actually wrong. Greenspan didn't advocate cuts in SS, just suggested raising the age or changing the COLA figures.

What he said is the real problem is Medicare because it is virtually impossible to detemine its cost. With an ageing population, advances in medical care, and additional entitlements (prescription drugs), this is the real culprit to our budget problems.

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for your clarification of what Greenspan really said not what people assume he said from the headlines:

The focus of this article is actually wrong. Greenspan didn't advocate cuts in SS, just suggested raising the age or changing the COLA figures.

What he said is the real problem is Medicare because it is virtually impossible to determine its cost. With an ageing population, advances in medical care, and additional entitlements (prescription drugs), this is the real culprit to our budget problems.

[CaptainLou]

Greenspan didn't advocate cuts in SS, just suggested raising the age or changing the COLA figures.

I've seen some proposals that say that simply reducing COLA to be more in-line with inflation along with raising the caps on SS taxable income could easily add 30 years or more to SS's solvency, so I agree with you that fixing SS is relatively easy when compared with Medicare.

I don't know an easy, politically acceptable fix for medicare. My guess is that you'll see more efforts to shift into being a catastrophic program, along with means testing for high income / high wealth recipients.