Seniors are paying close attention to talks of cutting Medicare costs, as both political parties wrestle with the escalating price of the nearly 50-year-old entitlement program.
“It would be dreadful if they made cuts. I wouldn’t be able to afford my medication,” said one 74-year-old senior, who wished not to be named, at the Encore Senior Center at West 49th Street, in New York City. “I’m on a fixed income. It would be a choice between food or medication. We’ve paid our dues, it’s time for the government to reimburse us somehow.”
A 63-year-old woman who called herself Hannah K. had concerns as well. “I take 2 pills a day and I pay $1 a month for it. Without Medicare, I would pay $200 a month.
“I get $500 a month from Social Security, that’s all I get. Rent for my apartment costs $400 a month. I don’t have any more money,” Hannah continued, expressing the view that seniors are entitled to receive help from the federal government. “In European countries such as Sweden and France, the government pays for all the seniors. I think it is the responsibility of the government in America as well to pay for seniors.”
With the passing of the recent payroll tax extension, which was signed into law by the president on Friday, focus was brought again to the role of and dependency on the federal government’s Medicare entitlement program. It provides health insurance coverage for the physically disabled, seniors over 65, and those meeting other criteria.
The tax extension included a “doc fix,” a short-term solution to protect physicians from cuts to Medicare payments—cuts that could force doctors to drop out of the social insurance program all together.
As the cost of Medicare continues to climb, both Republicans and Democrats see the current funding of the entitlement program as unsustainable, a conclusion supported by the Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees’ 2011 annual report.
“Projected long-run program costs for both Medicare and Social Security are not sustainable under currently scheduled financing, and will require legislative modifications if disruptive consequences for beneficiaries and taxpayers are to be avoided,” a summary of the Annual Trustees Report states.
President Obama’s American Jobs Act proposed in mid-September cuts included “$580 billion in adjustments to health and entitlement programs … $248 billion to Medicare and $72 billion to Medicaid,” according to the New York Times.
The solution may be a fundamental restructuring of the Medicare system, but such measures are sure to polarize partisan politics, as noted in the summary of a recent bipartisan bill proposing steps toward Medicare reform by Sen. Don Wyden (D-Oreg.) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.).
“Few issues draw more heated partisan rhetoric than the future of Medicare. Seniors are a reliable and powerful voting bloc, and both Republicans and Democrats are guilty of exploiting Medicare concerns to frighten and entice voters,” the two congressmen wrote in the lead paragraph of the bill’s executive summary.
“But turning discussions of Medicare’s future into the third rail of American politics not only does disservice to the more than 48 million Americans who currently rely on Medicare as their primary source of health insurance, but also does nothing to guarantee that Medicare will continue to be a lifeline for America’s seniors,” the summary added.
The challenge for government officials debating reform may be institutional, as generations of Americans have become dependent on Medicare’s support as they reach their senior years.
“We’ve been brainwashed. We think we are going to be taken care of by government programs when we’re older so a lot of us did not save money,” said 82-year-old Rosemary Diaz, who lives at the Encore Senior Center. “I would like to not depend on the government and pay for things myself; I would feel better as a person. But that’s not how it turned out.”
But Diaz, who came to “really resent the politics, the commercials,” has her own suggestion for reform. “I think the government should promote and teach young people to save money for the future, instead of telling us Medicare and Medicaid would take care of us,” she said.
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