Let me tell you something about Medicare
Posted By: SallySue on 2009-05-08
In Reply to: My take...... - sm
I am old enough to be on Medicare and thought I was going to have to take it, did not want to as I wanted to stay on my husband's insurance plan. I had heard things Medicare would pay or perhaps not and I have a PPO and wanted to stay that way. You have no choice if not on a company insurance and at 65 or so have to sign up for Medicare. If my husband were to be without his job, I can immediately switch over to Medicare without a break in my coverage. There are probably retirees out there who did not have their insurance continued because of their retirements who did not have the choice but to sign onto Medicare.
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Eligible for Medicare.............sm
does not mean free health care. My mother is a widow of almost 4 years now and draws a smidgen over $900 a month in SS benefits. Out of this, she has to pay almost $400 in health insurance, which is Medicare and AARP. She is also on several medications for age-related diseases and disorders. While her Medicare Part D does cover part of the cost of the medicines, it does not cover it all. In addition, she falls in the "donut hole" every fall and has to pay full price for her medications until the new year arrives. While her house is paid for, there are always repairs to be made specific to an aging house. In the last year alone, she has had to replace a dead stove, refrigerator and freezer. She also has to pay around $250 everytime the propane truck fills her tank, which is about every other month, especially in the winter.
Like the other poster mentioned, the reason "they" have their houses paid off is because they managed their money properly and did not live above their means. My dad never made more than $6/hour his entire life and he and mom raised my brother and me on that salary alone. We never knew we were "poor" because mom worked hard to stretch dad's paycheck and didn't spend it on getting her nails done or expensive clothes. She made every stitch of clothing I ever had with the exception of my wedding dress and bought my brother 3 pairs of Sears' Toughskin jeans at the beginning of every school year and they lasted all year. Dad had 3 suits of khaki work clothes most years. Sometimes when there was no money to buy new, she would patch the old ones to make them last. She never bought new clothes for herself but instead made them as she did for me.
While it infuriates me that I likely won't ever draw SS because it will be dried up and gone before I am eligible, it makes me madder still that our generation and the ones after us have caused this problem for our parents. What ungrateful children we are.
You don't believe in Social Security and Medicare?
What would your plan be for the elderly population then?
No drug laws? I thought libertarians only objected to posession of marijuana as a crime. I didn't know you actually objected to all drug laws. So then, you believe all drugs should be legalized?
You don't believe in a standing military. I am not sure I remember that right. It's hard to remember that very long list without it in front of me. So is your plan then that we should all live in a drug-haze, leave all other countries to their own devices and we won't need a military because we won't be bothering anyone and who will care anyway because, of course, we will all be stoned? I can't say that I see any cogent thought behind this list. It's a morally relative list of Doctor Feel Good. I thought libertarians had more sense. What a bummer dude.
I'm quite aware of how Medicare works...
I have been dealing with my mother's for years. You won't have to worry about your mother not being able to afford her medications for 4 months because the way it is being set up, your government will decide if your mother even needs that drug and if so, how many "pills" she can be dispensed and how long she can take it and if the GOVERNMENT doesn't feel it is helping, she will not be allowed to get any of it......PERIOD! They will decide if she is still young enough to make the government's handing her the meds worth their money or not. If not, they will allow her to do without and if that kills her, so be it. They have determined she is a lost case and doesn't deserve her medications, the medications I and you pay for.....but of course, Obama lovers just know their government knows best. Now they can decide if you live or die depending on your age. Just stick around folks.......it's gonna be sickening!!!
Medicare and social security
This today regarding Social Security and Medicare. For the person below who thought this money could not be used for other purposes, please note the *** paragraphs and the final paragraph stating this administration would run a deficit this year of $1.84 trillion, four times last year's record, and said the deficits will remain above $500 billion every year over the next decade.
Washington – The financial health of Social Security and Medicare, the government's two biggest benefit programs, have worsened because of the severe recession, and Medicare is now paying out more than it receives.
Trustees of the programs said Tuesday that Social Security will start paying out more in benefits than it collects in taxes in 2016, one year sooner than projected last year, and the giant trust fund will be depleted by 2037, four years sooner. Medicare is in even worse shape. The trustees said the program for hospital expenses will pay out more in benefits than it collects this year and will be insolvent by 2017, two years earlier than the date projected in last year's report.
*******The trust funds — which exist in paper form in a filing cabinet in Parkersburg, W.Va. — are bonds that are backed by the government's "full faith and credit" but not by any actual assets. That money has been spent over the years to fund other parts of government. To redeem the trust fund bonds, the government would have to borrow in public debt markets or raise taxes.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the head of the trustees group, said the new reports were a reminder that "the longer we wait to address the long-term solvency of Medicare and Social Security, the sooner those challenges will be upon us and the harder the options will be." Geithner said that President Barack Obama was committed to working with Congress to find ways to control runaway growth in both public and private health care expenditures, noting the promise Monday by major health care providers to trim costs by $2 trillion over the next decade. However, Republicans pointed to the newly dire assessments as evidence the Obama administration has failed to come forward with actual entitlement reform to close the funding gaps. "Instead of getting existing public programs in order right now, some are saying we should create a new government-run health insurance plan," Sen. Chuck Grassley, the top Republican on the Finance Committee, said in a reference to the administration's health care proposals. "When we can't afford the public health plan we have already, does it make sense to add more?" House Republican leader John Boehner said the trustees report "confirms what we already knew: Our nation cannot afford to continue this reckless borrowing and spending spree." The findings in the trustees report, the annual checkup given the two benefit programs, did not come as a surprise. Private economists had been predicting that the dates the programs would begin to pay out more than they take in and the dates the trust funds would be insolvent would occur sooner given the economic recession.
The deep recession, the worst the country has endured in decades, has resulted in a loss of 5.7 million jobs since it began in December 2007. The unemployment rate hit a 25-year high of 8.9 percent in April.
Fewer people working means less being paid into the trust funds for Social Security and Medicare. The Congressional Budget Office recently projected that Social Security will collect just $3 billion more in 2010 than it will pay out in benefits. A year ago, the CBO had projected that Social Security would have a much higher $86 billion cash surplus for the 2010 budget year, which begins Oct. 1. The trustees report projected that Social Security's annual surpluses would "fall sharply this year," then remain at a reduced level in 2010 and be lower in the following years than last year's projections. The report said that the Social Security annual surplus would be eliminated entirely in 2016, reflecting increased demands from the wave of 78 million baby boomers retiring. That means Social Security will have to turn to its trust fund to make up the difference between Social Security taxes and the benefits being paid out beginning in 2016. The trustees projected the trust fund would be depleted in 2037, four years earlier than the 2041 date in last year's report. At that point, the annual Social Security taxes collected would be enough to pay for three-fourths of current benefits through 2083.
*******To tap the trust fund, the government would have to increase borrowing or raise taxes because Social Security bonds exist only as bookkeeping entries. While the government is obligated to redeem those bonds, it has already spent the excess Social Security collections over the years to fund general government operations, providing the trust funds with IOUs.
While the smaller surpluses that will begin this year will not have any impact on Social Security benefit payments, the government will need to borrow more at a time when the federal deficit is already exploding because of the recession and the billions of dollars being spent to prop up a shaky banking system. Medicare's condition is more precarious, reflecting the pressures from soaring health care costs as well as the drop in tax collections. Obama on Monday praised the pledge by the health care industry to achieve $2 trillion in savings on health care costs over the next decade, but it was unclear how much help those pledges would be in achieving Obama's goal of extending coverage to some 50 million uninsured Americans. The administration is pushing Congress to pass legislation in this area this year, preferring to tackle health care before Social Security. The trustees report is likely to set off renewed debate over Social Security and Medicare. Critics have charged that the Obama administration has failed to tackle the most serious problems in the budget — soaring entitlement spending.
*****The administration on Monday revised its federal deficit forecasts upward to project an imbalance this year of $1.84 trillion, four times last year's record, and said the deficits will remain above $500 billion every year over the next decade.
they lose a lot of their income and also their Medicare if they marry - nm
x
You consider Social Security and Medicare expanding government projects, t hen?
Help me understand this concept. I am afraid the logic escapes me.
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