Medicare bankrupt by 2019

Here is the problem with the concept of Universal Health Care through "medicare for all" which is what many of the Presidential candidates claim as a solution. Medicare is a wonderful program that I do wish that I could get because it costs less for me and has better benefits than anything I could get. If you add more people onto the medicare system, it will be bankrupt sooner than 2019. I know I stated in an earlier blog that I thought Kucinich's idea would be the best model if Universal health care were to become reality. But I mostly meant the model THROUGH the non-profit insurer rather than the government provided single payor 'medicare for all'.

So before the government decides that it is a good idea to give away something else, I hope that they realize that they first need to make sure they have the ability to "give" me what they have already promised. I'm 35 years old now. . . I'll be 'eligible' for medicare in its current system in the year 2037. I pay my taxes into the medicare system and hope it is available for me. It is too hot a topic for any well meaning politician to discuss, so I don't expect it. Here is the article. . . enjoy.

Medicare will be bankrupt by 2019


Medicare Will Be Bankrupt by 2019
Taxpayer Groups Sound Alarm in Wake of Trustees' Report on Medicare
Written By: Tom Schatz
Published In: Budget & Tax NewsPublication
Date: May 1, 2004
Publisher: The Heartland Institute

Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW)--the 20-year-old watchdog group dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government--on March 25 criticized national leaders for "overseeing the fiscal deterioration of the Medicare program over the last four decades."

CAGW's criticism came in response to a report issued a day earlier by the trustees who monitor the fiscal health of Medicare and Social Security. The trustees estimate the fund for hospital bills in the Medicare program will run dry by 2019, seven years sooner than predicted last year, largely thanks to the new Medicare bill. Medicare begins dipping into its trust fund for the first time this year.

"Politicians in Washington ignored this problem for several decades, and then they make it worse by adding a costly prescription drug benefit," CAGW President Tom Schatz said. "The retirement of the baby boomers will spell fiscal doom for older and younger generations alike."
"Medicare's own trustees have confirmed what taxpayer advocates warned about all along," agreed John Berthoud, president of the National Taxpayers Union (NTU). "A 35 percent increase in the drug plan's 10-year cost estimate, mounting evidence that employers will dump seniors' private coverage, and now [the] trustees' report all add up to an economic doomsday scenario that thoughtful policymakers can't ignore any longer."