Is Bush's Medicare Plan "D" enacted in 03 part of the problem?

[FrenchieCat]

that is playing a role in the increase of our Deficit?

Is this what President Obama wants to review when he speaks of reviewing
our entitlement programs?

Cause it appears that there may be a problem there, that if it can be solved,
would greatly reduce future projected deficits.


Linda Bilmes Interview: The $10 Trillion Hangover -
Paying the Price for Eight Years of Bush
Amy Goodman | Democracy NOW! | Transcript from Veterans for Common Sense

You know, we were trying to understand the actual economic cost of the Bush administration......

Now, where does that debt come from? It comes from a combination of tax polices, because we have had two massive inequitable tax cuts, which of course reduced revenues, and an increase in spending. The increase in spending has gone essentially for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for a very significant military buildup unrelated to Iraq and Afghanistan, and for a number of commitments that are more expensive than they needed to be. For example, Medicare Part D, the idea of providing prescription drug benefits to seniors is a good idea, but this was done in a way that was much more expensive than it needs to be, because we—unlike in the Veterans Administration, for example, we don’t allow negotiation with drug companies to keep the prices low. So when you add up these things together, I mean, they result in, essentially, a doubling of the amount of debt that we have on the books.
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/38735



January 21, 2006
Fiscal Exposure and Medicare Part D
Even if the new Medicare prescription drug plan's implementation improves, that's just the beginning of our problems.

Much has been made of the snafus accompanying the start-up of the Medicare Part D prescription drug plan (see here and here for instance). But in my mind an even more important problem is the fiscal burden associated with this program. As this graph, drawn from David Walker's (Comptroller General, GAO) presentation at the White House Conference on Aging (December 12, 2005) points out, the passage and signing of this bill increased the implicit exposure of the Federal government by $8.1 trillion, in present value terms (exceeding the liability associated with future Social Security benefits of $5.2 trillion).
http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2006/01/fiscal_exposure.html

$1.8 Trillion in Deficits in Bush Plan, Study Says
By Peter G. Gosselin
March 08, 2003

Congress’ top fiscal analyst said Friday that President Bush’s new fiscal 2004 budget would produce a steady stream of deficits over the next decade totaling $1.8 trillion – a conclusion that seems certain to fuel new opposition to Bush’s latest crop of tax cuts.

Absent the president’s tax and spending plan, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Washington would run a surplus over 10 years of nearly $900 billion.

The budget office warned that neither figure includes money for a war with Iraq. The agency’s updated estimate of war costs suggested that the tab for the conflict and its immediate aftermath could easily run the $80 billion to $100 billion that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has dismissed as outsized. Democrats pounced on the new analysis as evidence that the administration’s new tax and spending plan is ill-conceived.

The analysis concludes that the costs of Bush’s planned tax cuts would be an additional $1.45 trillion over the next decade, even as he boosts spending by $1.25 trillion.

The tax cuts would come on top of those already enacted in 2001. The budget analysts said they were unable to estimate the costs of some of the administration’s most sweeping measures because the White House had not provided details. Among them: a prescription drug benefit for recipients of Medicare, the huge government health insurance program for the elderly, and a plan to let states convert Medicaid, the state-federal health program for low-income Americans, from an “entitlement” that qualified individuals automatically receive to a fixed amount of money, or block grant, that would go to state governments.

“The president’s policies will add trillions to the national debt and saddle Americans with a ‘debt tax’ for decades to come,” charged Rep. John M. Spratt Jr. of South Carolina, the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee. The White House responded by reiterating the president’s call for new tax cuts – to kick-start the stumbling U.S. economy.
http://articles.latimes.com/2003/mar/08/nation/na-cbo08

Unfunded obligations
The U.S. government is committed under current law to mandatory payments for programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. The GAO projects that payouts for these programs will significantly exceed tax revenues over the next 75 years. The Medicare Part A (hospital insurance) payouts already exceed program tax revenues and Social Security payroll taxes fully cover payouts only until 2017. These deficits require funding from other tax sources or borrowing.<56> The present value of these deficits or unfunded obligations is an estimated $41 trillion. This is the amount that would have to be set aside during 2008 such that the principal and interest would pay for the unfunded commitments through 2082. Approximately $7 trillion relates to Social Security, while $34 trillion relates to Medicare and Medicaid. In other words, healthcare programs are nearly five times as serious a funding challenge as Social Security. Adding this to the national debt during September 2008 of nearly $10 trillion and other federal commitments brings the total obligations to nearly $53 trillion.<66>

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has indicated that: "Future growth in spending per beneficiary for Medicare and Medicaid—the federal government’s major health care programs—will be the most important determinant of long-term trends in federal spending. Changing those programs in ways that reduce the growth of costs—which will be difficult, in part because of the complexity of health policy choices—is ultimately the nation’s central long-term challenge in setting federal fiscal policy."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_public_debt

[FrenchieCat]

1. The monkey editorial is a distraction.

don't let it rule your day or overtake the numbers of threads on this forum.

[Kdillard]

2. Kick because this is important with the summit coming up tomorrow.

Also this thread about it has me very concerned

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5105506



I will be waiting to see what comes out of it but I hope Obama is able to keep strong and protect SS, Medicare and Medicaid.

The incompetence of the Bush administration is astounding from his buying new aircrafts that are more expensive than necessary because he chose a company that wasn't well established doing this kind of work to this. I am hoping this is what Obama will be addressing in terms of fiscal responsibility and not the looting of benefits.

[windbreeze]

3. Medicare Part D....is a pia....

I have private insurance who before Part D...had a prescription allowance for it's retirees....after Part D...when you hit 65, they threw you entirely off their prescription coverage, and informed you that if you chose NOT to take part D...then you would have NO prescription coverage at all, period....They opted to pay the monthly fee that each retiree is charged to have Part D coverage...Right now, I believe they pay, out of the premiums we pay them for medical insurance, around $25 a month for each individual retiree...

Part D is NOT free...every retiree who has it, pays a monthly fee..sometimes a quite high fee, depending on what agency the Part D you have, is through...Our retiree program dropped the prescription coverage they previously had, because when their contract came up last time, that company raised the fee from $24 to something like $70 a month...and they had a $250 deductible right out of the gate....I can't even remember the name of that insurance, because I never got to use it...

There are things that need reformed when it comes to medicare and SS...there's no two ways about it...but let's hope they get the things that need to be fixed, w/o screwing everything up...

Ever hear of Medicare Advantage ??? The private medical insurance(HMO's) companies are raking in the dough hand over fist for any retiree who was dumb enough to sign up for one of those programs..(I hear there are lots of old people who are really sorry they did, because of all the restrictions placed on useage by the HMO)

The guy who tried to get me to sign up, painted this rosy picture about how much better they are...the retiree just continues to pay their regular medicare payment out of their SS every month....and then the gov't pays the difference...which can be as much as $500 or $600 a month....red flags went up for me...and I made him tell me several times, because it made NO sense to me...why would the gov't subsidize medical insurance payments for that amount for every individual signed up for advantage programs??? I asked him, you mean I don't get a bill at the end of every month, for the difference between what I pay out of my SS right now for parts A/B and what the advantage plan actually costs??? I was told NO...so if you want to know what is breaking the gov't...there's your answer...and I don't know how long, nor how many millions of retirees have signed up for those programs...but multiply a $500 difference against each one...and I am sure it is a staggering number, paid EVERY MONTH TO PRIVATE HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANIES...even IF it were only a difference of $200 a month...it would still be a staggering amount of money...and since I would have had to opt out of my private insurance, a plan I am familiar with, and have NO gripes about...I walked away...anything that sounds too good to be true...usually is...wb

[FrenchieCat]

4. I've heard this that you wrote about here.....

and it appears that this does need reform, and I believe that is what President Obama is talking about when he speaks of entitlement reform. My understanding is that this is the part of the entitlements that could literally bankrupt us in a way that we could never recover. All thanks to George Bush! :mad:

[windbreeze]

5. and there are many more

I know a 12yr old child, and both of his parents are alive...he is drawing SS, in the exact amount I draw, because he has behavioral problems...yet I worked close to 40 years for my SS...he gets his, just because our state had exhausted all the funds for a per needy child situation...so they threw him onto the backs of the Feds and SS...I don't believe that's what SS was intended for..and there are many, many of these cases...probably hundreds of thousands of them, across the country...don't get me wrong...I don't have a problem with someone truly disabled, being taken care of...however...SS should NOT be the program being used to do it...

YES, reform IS necessary...but there are those who are trying to use the issue as a scare tactic...to work people into a frenzy against any reform, when there are reforms that could be made, that would actually do some good...

IF only one million seniors are on medicare advantage programs with a difference in premium of $500 a month.....it adds up to $6 BILLION a YEAR that's being handed to private medical insurance companies...how long that can go on??...can't tell me that the gov't couldn't make better use of all that money.....wb