The Return of the Granny Bashers: More Attacks on Social Security and Medicare

[marmar]

The Return of the Granny Bashers: More Attacks on Social Security and Medicare
By Dean Baker
t r u t h o u t | Perspective

Monday 05 May 2008

Last month, a bipartisan group of prominent budget experts had a press event at the Brookings Institution where they argued that Congress had to make major cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. They claimed large cuts in these programs were necessary in order to prevent the explosion in the budget deficit that is projected if these programs stay on their current course.

While these experts are right to point to the long-term fiscal problems facing the country, the real problem is not the budget and these key programs on which tens of millions of people depend. The real problem is the United States has a broken health care system, which is projected to get progressively more inefficient through time.

Since roughly half of the country's health care costs are paid by the government, primarily through Medicare and Medicaid, the projected explosion in health care costs is also projected to lead to an explosion in government spending. If the health care system is never fixed, the burden on the budget will eventually be unsustainable, with annual deficits running into the trillions of dollars, exactly as the Brookings contingent claimed.

However, it is crucial the public recognize that the problem is health care costs, not a growing population of elderly. The two issues are easily confused, especially since most public sector health care costs go to provide health care for the elderly. The projected increase in the ratio of retirees to workers will impose a strain on the budget, but it will not be qualitatively different than the strain that aging has imposed in prior decades.

The country has always been aging - we are living longer - we can easily cover the cost of a growing population of retirees as long as the economy is healthy. With normal productivity and wage growth, our children and grandchildren will be able to support a larger population of retirees and still enjoy a better standard of living than we do; just as most of us now enjoy a better standard of living than our grandparents, even though we support a much larger number of retirees than they did in their working years.

However, if health care costs follow the projected trajectory, then the cost of Medicare, Medicaid, and other government health care programs will be unsustainable. Of course, in this scenario the rising cost of health care will also place an enormous burden on the private sector. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/050508C.shtml

[zanne]

1. A bipartisan group at the Brookings Institute?

That's an oxymoron!