This was the goal of breaking Glass Steagall and banking deregulation ---and we see where that led. So, a small percentage of health industry citizens will become extremely rich while all other employees become extremely poor and patients will be increasingly pushed out of a developed nation standard of care----and into a third world only the 1% and their 2% get ordinary health care format.
Now we are hearing from the CLINTON/OBAMA camp that at least health care costs are not rising AS FAST. That is supposed to be a good thing. Well, that is KARL MARX'S GRADUALISM.
Your Health
Rates Up 22 Percent For Obamacare Plans, But Subsidies Rise, Too
October 24, 20165:01 PM ET
Heard on All Things Considered
You can check HealthCare.gov for health insurance options and prices.
Andrew Harnik/AP
The cost of health insurance under the Affordable Care Act is expected to rise an average of 22 percent in 2017, according to information released by the Obama administration Monday afternoon.
Still, federal subsidies will also rise, meaning that few people are likely to have to pay the full cost after the rate increases to get insurance coverage.
"We think they will ultimately be surprised by the affordability of the premiums, because the tax credits track with the increases in premiums," said Kevin Griffis, assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services.
The 22 percent rise reflects the average for all insurance marketplaces, both federal and state-based exchanges for which data are available. For insurance purchased through the federal HealthCare.gov exchange the rise will average 25 percent.
During a media briefing Monday, Griffis said the 2017 rates are roughly at the level the Congressional Budget Office forecast when the law was proposed. "The initial marketplace rates came in below costs," he said. "Many companies set prices that turned out to be too low."
Enrollment opens Nov. 1. For coverage effective Jan. 1, people need to pick a plan by Dec. 15. With a few exceptions, the last day to sign up for Obamacare is Jan. 31, 2017. Plans are available on HealthCare.gov and state-run exchanges.
While the average premiums on the benchmark health plans are increasing, the government says more than 70 percent of people buying insurance on the marketplaces created by the law could get a health plan for less than $75 a month for 2017. To get the best deal, people would have to pick a low-cost plan with limited benefits and take advantage of all the subsidies available.
People who already have coverage through the exchanges can often save money by switching plans, the administration said. More than three-quarters of people could save money by switching to the lowest-cost plan within the level of coverage, such as bronze or silver, that they've previously selected.
The Obamacare insurance exchanges are under strain after three major insurers pulled back from offering coverage in markets across the U.S. The administration says about 1 in 5 people buying insurance through the marketplaces will have only one company offering coverage.
It's in places like that where consumers will feel the most pain. "Where it really matters is where a big insurance company has exited and where that's going to leave just one company remaining," said Cynthia Cox, associate director of health reform and private insurance at the Kaiser Family Foundation. "For those people who live in that area, many people may have to switch plans. And they won't have much choice if they want to receive financial assistance and purchase through the exchanges."
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When Medicare was created the payroll taxes tied to Medicare was to augment later health care costs. We paid payroll taxes for 5 decades and baby boomers have mostly paid in full their health costs. We have citizens who are seniors that did not pay into Medicare because they did not earn enough---or were left long-term unemployed and they are falling into a Medicaid level of health care.
People think seniors today are not paying for that Federal insurance plan but they have been and are slowly paying quite a bit ----just as if Medicare was a private health plan and not the health savings account it was supposed to be. So seniors are not getting that health savings account---they are slowly paying what any private health care policy owner would pay. They privatized Medicare and are charging seniors as though they have a private health plan-----deductions from Social Security and those deductions are becoming larger and larger. Of course many Americans are only the lowest level of Social Security payments ---around $750 today ----so they cannot have but so much deducted and as such they are being pushed to a Medicaid status as seniors. Remember, a large percentage of Americans now impoverished paid plenty of payroll taxes for decades---they have simply fallen into poverty these few decades of CLINTON/BUSH/OBAMA.
'It isn’t just the fact that Social Security payments are reduced by Medicare premiums. It’s also because Medicare costs have increased at a faster rate than the Social Security inflation adjustment, as the Senior Citizens League attests in this recent MarketWatch column on beating inflation':
'However, because by law any higher costs to the Medicare system must be paid by beneficiaries, and since most beneficiaries will not pay higher rates because of their incomes in 2016 (held harmless), higher-income recipients, along with new enrollees during the year, will pay much higher monthly premiums in 2016 due to the lack of a COLA'.
They are making it sound like upper-middle class seniors are SUBSIDIZING the lower class when in fact everyone is getting fleeced with more affluent seniors getting fleeced even more. They are not subsidizing lower class----we have already paid for this. Remember, the goal of Medicare was to have all workers pay and that bolus of Medicare Trust was to care for all aging seniors.
Seniors are now paying $2,000 a year for a health policy that was pre-paid by decades of payroll taxes and this is basic access-----seniors are now having to buy that MEDICARE PLUS PLAN.
August 27, 2015
No Social Security COLA in 2016: Higher Medicare Premiums for Your Clients
Some retirees will bear the brunt of higher Medicare Part B premiums due to their higher income and no Social Security COLA, the Center for Retirement Research reports
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Medicare premiums will take a bigger bite out of higher-income retirees' Social Security benefits.Your retired clients’ Medicare Part B premiums have remained at the same level in 2015 as they were in 2014, but absent some political moves in Washington, that will change in 2016.
According to an August paper from the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, Part B premiums for higher-income Americans are scheduled to rise significantly in 2016. That’s because it appears there will be no cost-of-living adjustment for Social Security recipients in 2016--for only the third time in the past 40 years.
Lower inflation and no 2016 COLA for Social Security recipients will cause a “flap in the Medicare program” next year, point out CRR authors Alicia Munnell and Anqi Chen, because by law, the cost of higher Medicare Part B premiums cannot be passed on to most beneficiaries — about 70%, they say, who are considered “held harmless” on premiums — when they do not get a raise in their overall Social Security benefits.
To begin, why won’t there be a COLA for Social Security recipients next year? Any adjustment in Social Security benefits as of Jan. 1 of each year is based on comparing CPI-W in the third quarter of the preceding year (2015 in this case) with the CPI in the prior year’s (2014 in this case) third quarter. The CPI in 2015’s third quarter is, so far, below 2014’s third-quarter inflation, and thus no COLA.
One example: Only 9% of consumers say they’re ‘very knowledgeable’ about benefits, but 40% expect those benefits to account for...
(CPI-W, the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers, is used by the Social Security Administration to adjust benefits for both Social Security and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients.)
Parts B of Medicare, funded by Social Security’s Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Fund, covers physician and outpatient hospital services (Part B) and Part D pays for prescription drugs (Part A is funded by a separate Hospital Insurance Trust Fund and pays for inpatient hospital services, home health and hospice care and “skilled nursing facilities,” i.e., nursing homes).
The paper points out that 75% of the costs of Parts B and D are paid from the government’s general revenues; the remaining 25% comes from monthly premiums paid by beneficiaries out of their Social Security benefits before those benefits are sent.
Beginning in 2007, Part B premiums became based on the income of the beneficiary. Munnell and Chen write that under current law, Part B premiums for other beneficiaries “must be raised enough to offset premiums foregone due to the hold-harmless provision.” The estimated monthly premium in 2016 for these other beneficiaries will be $159.30, up 52% from 2015’s $104.90 monthly premium. Higher income participants, they write, would then pay “multiples of $159.30 depending on their income level."
Here’s what the premiums were in 2015 for higher-income Medicare enrollees:
Income-Related Part B Premiums for 2015
Source: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
However, because by law any higher costs to the Medicare system must be paid by beneficiaries, and since most beneficiaries will not pay higher rates because of their incomes in 2016 (held harmless), higher-income recipients, along with new enrollees during the year, will pay much higher monthly premiums in 2016 due to the lack of a COLA.
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As more affluent seniors see themselves having to pay premiums over and beyond Medicare and see those premiums rise------citizens at the lower income scale are seeing their access to what seniors for decades have known to be ordinary access to all hospital treatments for disease vectors----disappear. The media leads the American people to believe these lower-income seniors are being subsidized and keeping that standard of care WHEN THEY ARE NOT. All of this is just beginning to show during these several years of OBAMA AND CLINTON NEO-LIBERAL privatization of our Medicare and Medicaid with the Affordable Care Act----but it will become increasingly apparent as more families see loved ones die for lack of ordinary care. This coming economic crash will broaden and deepen poverty---so this will be coming to close to 90% of Americans---
AND WE PAID PAYROLL TAXES TRIPLED BY REAGAN TO ASSURE THAT ALL OF THIS WAS PRE-PAID.
So, Affordable Care Act ends Medicare-----and in transition will send most Americans to a MEDICAID FOR ALL status. Medicaid has been gutted of funding and no longer exists as an equal opportunity program so winners and losers pay-to-play to get health care----this is what happens when we allow FAR-RIGHT 1% WALL STREET GLOBAL CORPORATE NEO-LIBERALS take our Democratic Party---
THESE 2016 DEMOCRATIC ELECTION FRAUDS MATTER!
'That’s why Medicare was first enacted. People over 65 were unable to buy commercial insurance because they use three times more medical services than working people; it was unaffordable or insurers simply refused to provide it' 'It pools the resources of the entire nation to protect older and disabled Americans from the risk of an unforeseeable financial disaster in the event of an acute illness, an injury, or an expensive chronic condition. All American workers finance the program and all are covered by it once eligible: no one is excluded because of their age, health status, or their income'.
Don't be played by class -----1% Wall Street is fleecing everyone as usual.
Medicare And Commercial Health Insurance: The Fundamental Difference
Diane Archer and Theodore Marmor
February 15, 2012
As the debate over Medicare continues in connection to America’s fiscal problems, it is critical to understand how Medicare differs from commercial health insurance for working people. There is a fundamental difference between these two types of health insurance plans, one social and one commercial.
The basic difference between Medicare and commercial insurance is that Medicare is designed to absorb risk, serving individuals who have or may have costly and complex medical needs as well as the relatively healthy, whereas commercial insurance is required to protect its business interests by avoiding those most likely to use medical care. That’s why Medicare was first enacted.
People over 65 were unable to buy commercial insurance because they use three times more medical services than working people; it was unaffordable or insurers simply refused to provide it. And now it’s simply unrealistic to imagine that commercial insurance companies will change their fundamental business model and work to protect the health and financial security of most Americans.
Medicare’s mandate:
Medicare is a federally administered insurance program that Americans pay into throughout our working lives and enroll in after they retire or in case of a serious disability. It pools the resources of the entire nation to protect older and disabled Americans from the risk of an unforeseeable financial disaster in the event of an acute illness, an injury, or an expensive chronic condition. All American workers finance the program and all are covered by it once eligible: no one is excluded because of their age, health status, or their income. Meanwhile the program is obligated to pay for all necessary care for the eligible population, wherever they live in the country and whatever else may be true about their history, prospects, and preferences. Medicare only denies claims for medically unnecessary care.
Commercial insurance’s mandate:
Commercial health insurance, even with regulations, has an entirely different mandate. Its fundamental purpose is commercial. Insurance corporations receive premiums that must fund the costs of their enrollees’ health care and administrative costs, as well as profit margins sufficient to allow borrowing in the capital markets. To make that work, insurance firms avoid risk. They are rewarded for avoiding, within the rules of the day, those who are already sick, those likely to become sick, and those whose incomes are relatively low.
In short private insurers must limit the risks they take on in order to survive. And that itself explains a good deal of the behavior that has made commercial health insurance firms unpopular: inclinations to make eligibility difficult for anyone who has or whom they believe is likely to have a costly condition, postpone the payment of claims, quibble about the scope of coverage, and many other behaviors that have filtered into the day to day vocabulary of Americans. The Affordable Care Act takes a good first step at moderating differences and limiting this behavior, but it cannot and does not encourage insurers to pool risk or design plans that attract people with costly conditions as Medicare does.
Commercial insurers will always seek to minimize their exposure to risk: It’s simply unrealistic to expect commercial insurers to do the job Medicare is already doing. Before Medicare was created in 1965, many argued that the federal government should simply subsidize the purchase of commercial insurance for seniors. But it became clear — even to the industry — that commercial insurers could not find a way to profitably cover older Americans, even with a subsidy. Yet today, some in Congress are embracing the system that was rejected nearly 50 years ago.
The fundamental nature of commercial insurers will undermine any effort to use them to protect the most vulnerable Americans. No matter what regulations are instituted in an attempt to guarantee their good behavior, commercial insurers will still have an incentive to avoid risk, and they will do so insofar as it is possible.
In Massachusetts, where insurers must offer coverage to anyone, plans avoid offering adequate coverage for costly conditions and disguise what they are actually selling. Even heavily regulated Medicare Advantage commercial plans are designed to push people in poor health into traditional Medicare in order to avoid actually paying for care, and they have successfully overcome policies meant to halt this practice. They are also less likely than traditional Medicare to counteract the health care inequalities facing people of color, people with low incomes, the chronically ill, and the disabled.
Since commercial insurers are not publicly accountable, it is difficult to say exactly how commercial insurers perpetuate these inequalities; their data are proprietary, and they generally keep the payment policies that allow them to remain profitable secret.
Medicare is more cost-effective than commercial insurance: Commercial insurance is less effective than Medicare on any number of metrics. Because Medicare has such an enormous coverage pool, the program has bargaining power that no commercial insurance company can match. On average, Medicare manages to pay 22 percent less than what commercial plans pay for physician services, so the only way those plans could compete would be by offering 22 percent fewer services.
Unsurprisingly, Medicare’s per capita costs have risen more slowly than commercial insurers’ and are projected to continue doing so. Meanwhile, commercial insurers invest so many resources in avoiding paying for actual medical care that their administrative costs are much higher. Commercial insurance meets the health care needs of most working people because most workers most of the time do not need a lot of health care.
Only Medicare is designed to insulate Americans from risk: This essay has laid out the differences between two different ideal types of insurance. The realities of how plans actually work can be substantially more complicated. Medicare hospital insurance (Part A) most fully conforms to the social insurance model, since it is financed by proportional contributions from all citizens, whereas Part B uses general revenue and a yearly premium. Meanwhile regulations can moderate the difference between commercial and social insurance. But nothing can change the underlying reality that programs like Medicare are designed to absorb and broadly distribute risk, protecting everyone, while commercial insurers are designed to select and protect individuals with the fewest needs.
The belief that competition among private health insurance firms can produce cost savings or higher quality care represents the victory of illusion over evidence. We need to let the existing Medicare system do what it already does effectively: insulate Americans from risk, rather than shift risk to the most vulnerable citizens.
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If we read national media we are told many things regarding Medigap-----public and private plans----and as usual most of what they print is not true. The policies of Medicare and Federal funding of Medigap have one goal-----the first stage is to push seniors OFF FEDERAL PUBLIC MEDIGAP POLICIES AND ON TO PRIVATE MEDIGAP POLICIES---MEDICARE ADVANTAGE and this is being done by weakening what public Medigap will cover. The next step will be to end private Medicare Advantage using the excuse that it is not profitable. None of these Federal health programs are meant to be profitable----they are PUBLIC TRUSTS FOR GOODNESS SAKE---WE PRE-PAID FOR ALL THIS HEALTH CARE COVERAGE.
Baby boomers have these several years been aging towards retirement--this is why 1% global Wall Street has its pols working NOW to end public health. Seniors on Medicare now are seeing rates rise but still manageable but seniors this coming decade will see they will not access health care at all---only preventative and clinic care----not hospital and disease vector care----such as diabetes.
Those 20% of Americans having weathered all Wall Street booms and busts to maintain an affluent retirement/savings----will be aging into what will take much of that disposable income ----DO THINK UPPER-MIDDLE CLASS WILL BE ACCESSING ORDINARY CARE FOR LONG!
It becomes national media's job to make Americans feel that subtle changes are occurring but loses will be subsidized---don't worry -----maximizing health industry profits while creating extreme wealth and extreme poverty -----we'll do all that and still have a developed nation USA!
What's worse than a US ranked second world in health care costs and access? A third world ranking!
Congress Schedules End to Insurance Coverage of Medicare Part B Deductible
Medicare beneficiaries often buy “Medigap” insurance that pays for many of regular Medicare’s deductibles and copayments. But as a result of legislation just passed by Congress, starting in 2020 Medigap plans will no longer be allowed to offer coverage of the Medicare Part B deductible, which is currently $166 (in 2016). However, current Medigap policyholders and those buying policies before 2020 will still be eligible for the deductible coverage after that date.
The change is an effort to help pay for so-called “doc fix” legislation that overhauls the way Medicare pays doctors and that is expected to cost $200 billion over 10 years. Medicare Part B covers doctor visits and other outpatient care, and currently Medigap plans C and F offer coverage of the Part B deductible. The reasoning behind making Medicare beneficiaries pay the deductible themselves is that it will cause them to think twice before going to a doctor and perhaps costing the Medicare system unnecessary money.
Some argue, however, that if the change prompts beneficiaries to forego needed medical care, they may simply require more expensive care later, costing Medicare more in the end. Critics also say that the change will encourage more beneficiaries to abandon regular Medicare and join Medicare Advantage plans, which will still be able to cover the deductible.
In addition to the Medigap change, affluent seniors will have to pay higher Part B premiums as a result of the legislation. Starting in 2018, individuals with incomes between $133,500 and $214,000 (or twice these figures for couples) will pay more; details here. And the regular Part B premium will rise faster than under current law as a result of the "doc fix" legislation.
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If we think ObamaCare looks just like RomneyCare and wonder what is the difference between these candidates who PRETEND TO BE conservative and social progressive. The answer is they are neither----they are simply CLINTON/BUSH/OBAMA MOVING FORWARD the same privatized, profit-driven, global health systems ending our public health and Medicare and Medicaid Trusts in the US.
Below we see Bill Clinton doing just that as he POSED SOCIAL PROGRESSIVE BACK IN THE 1990S TO SAVING AND PROTECTING MEDICARE-----and he started the defunding, dismantling of oversight and accountability that allowed the health care industry to fleece our Federal health programs of hundreds of billions each year.
IT WAS CLINTON SETTING THE STAGE FOR PRIVATIZING AND ENDING MEDICARE AND MEDICAID---JUST AS WITH ALL NEW DEAL AND WAR ON POVERTY.
It was Bill and Hillary as Clinton Initiative that partnered with Microsoft's Bill Gates to promote the building of Gate's global PHARMA corporation. It is Bill and Hillary with team Obama and Bush that promoted Trans Pacific Trade Pact packed with global health policy having a goal of ending public health subsidy around the world-----THAT IS WHO IS KILLING OUR US PUBLIC HEALTH----ONCE THE BEST IN THE WORLD.
All of the secrecy behind Hillary and her heading the health care reform during Bill's terms was just what we see with Obama----she was seeking to privatize and end Medicare and Medicaid as well. The far-right Republican think tanks call HEALTH CARE FOR ALL simply gutted of funding MEDICAID FOR ALL-----preventative health care access only which is what ROMNEYCARE/OBAMACARE IS.
'Three years ago Clinton himself proposed basically the same package of reforms for Medicare--a fact everyone seems to have forgotten since it was embedded in his massive, ill-fated Health Security Act. Here's the rundown'.
Remember, REAGAN had just tripled payroll taxes so SS and Medicare Trusts would handle baby boomers---then Clinton starts to defund and create conditions for fleecing of these trusts to occur.
Clinton's Medicare Cuts
Bill in '93 = Bob in '96.
By John Merline
D uring the first presidential and vice presidential debates, Bob Dole and Jack Kemp were hit by Medicare attacks from Bill Clinton and Al Gore some 22 times. That's an average of one Medicare attack every four minutes.
Dole's sins: Not only did he want to slash $270 billion from the program--more than needed to protect the Medicare "trust fund"--he wanted to hike premiums, force seniors to pay more out of pocket for care, and push them into managed care. Dole and House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the president and vice president said, wanted Medicare to "wither on the vine." All these were, as Gore put it on Meet the Press recently, "extremist measures that would have devastated Medicare."
Thank God Clinton was there to stop it.
Dole's limp response was that he would honor his mother's word not to cut Medicare. He needn't be so defensive. Three years ago Clinton himself proposed basically the same package of reforms for Medicare--a fact everyone seems to have forgotten since it was embedded in his massive, ill-fated Health Security Act. Here's the rundown.
Big Cuts vs. Slower Growth. Consider this exchange in the veep debate:
Jack Kemp: "The president himself suggested that the reduction in the growth of Medicare over the next five or six years ought to be held to 6 percent. Under the Republican plan, irrespective of the numbers, it will grow at 7 or even more percent."
Al Gore: "I think Mr. Kemp has unintentionally made a mistake in saying that President Clinton called for a reduction to 6 percent. ... It is not the president's position."
Nobody bothered to check out this one. But the fact is that in 1993 Clinton boasted he could cut Medicare growth to 6 percent while protecting the program.
Here's Clinton speaking to the American Association of Retired Persons in October that year: "Today, Medicaid and Medicare are going up at three times the rate of inflation. We propose to let it go up at two times the rate of inflation." Given that prices were expected to climb 3 percent a year, Clinton meant 6 percent growth for Medicare.
"That is not a Medicare or Medicaid cut," he reassured seniors. "So when you hear all this business about cuts, let me caution you that that is not what is going on. We are going to have increases in Medicare and Medicaid, and a reduction in the rate of growth."
A draft summary of the Health Security Act, released in September of 1993, contained a chart showing projected growth for Medicare slowing to less than 6 percent by 1997, and less than 5 percent by 1999. And in its independent review of the Clinton plan, health-care consulting firm Lewin-VHI noted that the act "attempts to slow the growth in public and private health spending to the rate of growth in the CPI plus an allowance for population growth." That puts Medicare growth at just over 4 percent a year.
Far from devastating, this slowdown was, the White House said at the time, good for seniors. Ira Magaziner told a press briefing that "slowing the rate of growth actually benefits beneficiaries considerably because it slows the rate of growth of the premiums they have to pay."
But looked at in the terms the White House uses today, Clinton was proposing cuts in Medicare spending beyond the $270 billion Republicans dared propose.
Like the GOP plan, Clinton wanted to take a big chunk of savings from Medicare providers--doctors and hospitals--by cutting back payments to them.
M ore Cuts Than Needed. At one point, Clinton warned that the GOP cuts were "more than was necessary to repair the Medicare trust fund." The implied political point was that Medicare cuts were going to pay for tax cuts for the rich.
Clinton's Health Security Act, however, also cut Medicare more than was needed to repair the trust fund. Most of the savings from Medicare were to be plowed back into new federal health programs. As the Congressional Budget Office put it: "Reductions in Medicare spending would provide a major part of the funding for the Administration's proposal." More than a quarter of it, by White House calculations.
Raise Costs to Seniors.
Several times during the debates, Clinton and Gore said that the Republicans' Medicare-reform plan would have boosted costs to seniors. "It would have charged seniors more for out-of-pocket costs as well as more in premiums," Clinton said at one point.
Under Clinton's Health Security Act, more than a quarter of the savings came out of the hides of seniors. They were to be charged higher premiums for Medicare Part B, the program that covers physician services. New copayments were to be added for some Medicare services that are now 100 percent covered. Over six years, those costs to seniors would have totaled $33 billion.
To be sure, Clinton concentrated the premium hikes for Part B on the well-to-do--those seniors earning $90,000 a year or more. The rest would pay only a quarter of the premium cost, with taxpayers picking up the rest. The GOP set the contribution rate at just under one-third of the full cost, but they also "means tested" the premiums so that seniors with incomes over $75,000 would pay a bigger chunk.
Push Seniors Into Managed Care.
"Sen. Dole's Medicare plan ... would have forced a lot of seniors into managed care," Clinton said. That's something of a misrepresentation. The GOP plan would have expanded the managed-care options open to seniors, and encouraged them to take it. Today, seniors can stick with Medicare, or opt for Health Maintenance Organization (HMO) coverage, with the government ponying up the premiums. The GOP plan would have opened that door to the rest of the alphabet soup of private managed-care plans, such as preferred-provider organizations, point-of-service plans and physician hospital organizations.
So would Clinton's 1993 reforms, and even his more recent Medicare proposals. One section in his Health Security Act was titled "Encouraging Managed Care Under Medicare Program." Clinton's current reform proposal suggests expanding managed-care options for seniors. The only difference between the Republicans and Clinton on this score is that the GOP wanted to give seniors one extra option--to enroll in a "medical savings account" plan.
WHICH OBAMA DID
Both parties used basically the same regulatory machinery to try to make their plans work in the market without creating a huge "adverse selection" problem--healthier seniors opting into lower-cost plans. The Republicans' machinery, in fact, was borrowed almost verbatim from Clinton's plan--which, in a double twist, the GOP had previously attacked as unworkable.
Let Medicare Wither on the Vine.
Clinton twice said that Medicare would "wither on the vine" under Republican reforms. The reference is to a comment by House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who said that the GOP wanted the Medicare bureaucracy to wither on the vine, as seniors opted for the private plans. But the quote has been misused by Democrats ever since.
In any case, Clinton also forecast the decline of the Medicare bureaucracy. New retirees under his Health Security Act would be able to stick with the plan they had when they worked. The government would pay the premiums instead of the employer. Current retirees could choose a private managed-care plan. According to the Congressional Budget Office, Clinton's plan would have moved nearly 3 million seniors from Medicare into private plans in 1998 alone.
To be fair, the White House wanted to sweeten the Medicare pot at the same time it was making these cuts by adding a prescription-drug benefit.
It has also claimed since that its proposed cuts in Medicare were acceptable because they were in the context of "universal health care reform." But that wasn't the argument it made at the time. Hillary Rodham Clinton told a Senate panel in 1993 that savings in Medicare were easy because "we have too many examples now of how it can be done better at lower costs with the same or better quality, and that's what we're counting on."
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Folks think we are conspiracy theorist because we know what the original founding and goal of national corporate non-profits are----here we have AARP founded by someone tied to who else-----CORPORATE INSURANCE---COLONIAL PENN. AARP has been used by 1% Wall Street to allow policies installed as SOCIALLY PROGRESSIVE---AS GOOD FOR SENIORS be sold that way. It was not created to protect seniors but to advance corporate insurance policy and AARP has tied itself to ENDORSEMENTS OF PRODUCTS said to be helping seniors. Have you tried that cellular corporation with discount rates for seniors? Talk about rip off.
So, AARP was sent in to deregulate our Medicare by creating its own MEDIGAP-----they kept it public with the intent of privatizing Medicare away. That step of public Medigap Insurance created a way for seniors to bridge rising health care costs caused by widespread health industry fraud and profiteering -----Bill Clinton doing to our Federal Health Care what he did to banking----our Federal Housing Agency----and our Federal Education student loan program-----
It would have been an AARP that shouted with REAL social Democrats in the 1990s against Bill Clinton that all of what his policies did was going to end our Federal Medicare and Medicaid programs----which it did. While Bush allowed all that health industry fraud to soar-----he waited for an Obama to end it because know who is hurt most? Black and brown citizens-----wait for Hillary because it is women hurt by losing Federal public health-----and that is the reason for these faces on 1% Wall Street global corporate neo-liberalism----FAR-RIGHT WING WALL STREET do not work for public interest.
AARP
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
AARP, Inc.
AARP logo, eff. January 2007
Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Formerly calledAmerican Association of Retired Persons
AARP, Inc., formerly the American Association of Retired Persons, is a United States-based interest group with a membership founded in 1958 by Ethel Percy Andrus, Ph.D., a retired educator from California, and Leonard Davis, later the founder of the Colonial Penn Group of insurance companies.
Of course sending all that Medicare Trust funding to public and private MediGap over these few decades simply drained to a corporation more and more of our TRUST-------AARP WAS TRUST-BUSTING as it PRETENDED to fight for our SS and Medicare Trusts.
If we educate broadly on public policy we knew all this in 1990s-----so we would not keep falling for progressive posing non-profits and leaders and media working for 1% Wall Street and not WE THE PEOPLE.
AARP Moves to Protect Social Security and Medicare
Seniors’ group launches “You’ve Earned a Say” program to defend against cuts it feels are unfair.
By Philip Moeller | Staff Writer March 20, 2012, at 10:00 a.m.
AARP began to engage its 37 million members Monday in an effort to dissuade Congress from making what they feel would be unfair cuts to Social Security and Medicare benefits. AARP's "You've Earned a Say" program is being promoted through town hall meetings in every state, online member surveys, and national advertising.
AARP said the program is educational and will not include direct lobbying efforts or be used in this year's elections. But it will build and communicate an extensive record of how individuals are affected by the two programs.
Cuts to both programs have been called for in a series of budget deficit proposals, including the bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. Since its report more than a year ago, several other sets of proposals have been introduced but sidetracked by the increasingly partisan political divide in Congress.
"Instead of talking about balancing the budget on the backs of America's seniors, they should be talking about ways to strengthen" these programs, AARP CEO Barry Rand said at a town hall meeting. "It's time to have a debate about the health and retirement security of real Americans."
AARP also released results of a national survey of adults of all ages. By overwhelming levels of 80 to 90 percent, they said Social Security and Medicare were crucial to people's financial security and health in retirement, and that Washington was deciding the future of these programs behind closed doors and without listening to the needs of ordinary citizens.
"We all know Washington isn't listening and that the only way to get them to listen is to get you involved," Rand said in a series of town hall meetings in Columbus, Ohio, Denver, Miami, and Richmond, Va. "AARP is listening even if Washington is not listening ... There is no American dream if you don't have Medicare and Social Security."
Here are the challenges that AARP sees to both programs:
Social Security
• Social Security can pay full benefits for nearly 25 years. After that, it will still be able to pay about 75 percent of promised benefits for the next 75 years or more even if no changes are made.
• In 1940, a 65-year-old could expect to live an additional 12 or 13 years. A 65-year-old today can expect to live another 20 years, and thus collect benefits for longer periods.
• The drop in birthrates and the increase in life expectancies have reduced the number of workers per beneficiary to 2.8; by 2036, the ratio will be 2.1 workers for each beneficiary.
Medicare
• In only 12 years, there will be a shortfall in the money needed to pay full benefits in the Medicare Part A Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, which helps pay for inpatient hospital care.
• The total number of Medicare beneficiaries is expected to double—from about 40 million to 80 million—between the years 2000 and 2030.
• Rising healthcare costs have increased both the overall cost of Medicare as well as the amount older Americans spend out-of-pocket.
• Medicare currently accounts for just under 14 percent of all federal spending, but it is projected to increase from $471 billion in 2012 to $818 billion in 2021.
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Just an aside------here is Colonial PENN----the insurance corporation started back in the mid-1900s-----with the founder of AARP -----Colonial PENN leads in subpriming the LIFE INSURANCE INDUSTRY----just as housing loans were subprimed------anyone with a pulse can now get life insurance. 1% Wall Street has done this these few decades because LIFE INSURANCE corporations are going to implode in this coming bond market collapse and fraud.
So, when social Democrats shout----STAY AWAY FROM NATIONAL NON-PROFITS that pretend to be working for labor and justice----this is one. AARP founder not only worked to privatize and end Medicare but has worked to fleece LIFE INSURANCE CONSUMERS.
BUT EVERYONE'S FAVORITE ALEX TREBECK OF JEOPARDY HAWKS THIS! WELL YES, ALL HOLLYWOOD STARS WORK FOR GLOBAL 1% WALL STREET.
Colonial Penn Insurance Products
New York Residents Click Here
Life Insurance Products
For over 50 years, Colonial Penn has specialized in offering life insurance directly to consumers at affordable prices. Through mail, TV, our call center and the web, we focus on providing life insurance protection for folks like you and your loved ones.
Guaranteed Acceptance Life InsuranceAcceptance GUARANTEED- No medical
exam, no health questions
You Cannot Be Turned Down (ages 50-85) You cannot be turned down because of your health. This is permanent, whole life insurance with no health questions asked and no physical to take.
Guaranteed Acceptance Plan Features Include
- Locked in Benefit Amount after 2nd year
- Locked-In Rate
- Permanent Lifetime Protection
- Begins to build cash value after 1st year
Instant Quote
Learn MoreWhole Life InsuranceWhole Life up to $50,000
No medical exam, your answers to a few health questions help us determine your eligibility
Whole Life (ages 40-75) Permanent, whole life insurance that lasts a lifetime. Once insured, your premium rate will not change for the life of the policy.
Plan Features
- Coverage up to $50,000 - Affordable Rates
- Easy online application