Like Trump, I oppose cutting the benefits of Social Security and Medicare. Both programs are afflicted with bad design and I never would have done it that way. To be fair, FDR didn't want it that way either. He wanted something like individual accounts but his veto was overridden. However, here we are and many people depend on those prog…
Like Trump, I oppose cutting the benefits of Social Security and Medicare. Both programs are afflicted with bad design and I never would have done it that way. To be fair, FDR didn't want it that way either. He wanted something like individual accounts but his veto was overridden. However, here we are and many people depend on those programs to have any sort of retirement at all. They acted in good faith and were taxed to provide those benefits. The only way you can get out of that trap is to run a new system in parallel with the old one with any new entrants going into the old system. However, that is very expensive and can't happen until some of the other problems are solved. There is some room to cut expenditures by targeting fraud. It the case of Medicare, that is provider fraud. In the case of SS, it is to be found in the disability portion of the program and not so much in the retirement part.
Don't fall into the Paul Ryan heresy and conflate Medicaid with the other two. Medicaid is pure welfare.
Medicaid is the final backstop, the last resort for medical care for many millions of Americans. Cut it and many will suffer, and struggling hospitals (especially in rural areas) will finally give up the ghost. It is without question ‘welfare’ but aside from letting people get sick and die there doesn’t seem to be an alternative.
Agreed but it is different from the others two. I can think of a number of policy issues that would improve it while the other two have a contractual basis. (I know what the Supreme Court said but this is the same institution that said that free blacks aren't citizens. ). The issue that links the three is fraud and that should be addressed first. Supposedly Elon's war band has found billions in payments to the same SS number or to no number at all. Then hammer some sleazy providers in both Medicare and Medicaid. Then see if we need policy changes.
I don't doubt there is SSI fraud. People claiming a back problem and getting scrips for oxy. But we still need the program. Workers comp doesn't cover everything, and for kids orphaned or wives widowed it can be a godsend.
Similarly with Medicaid. For old people Medicare only covers a couple months in the hospital, then after you sell everything you own except the house Medicaid will pay for the nursing home until you die, and then when your widow dies they take the money from selling the house.
Currently our personal health insurance which covers just about everything is valued at around $36,000 on our W2, and we pay no taxes on that money. Most people where I live, our health insurance is about the same as their income. Poor people, or even people who work full time but don't make much money, they simply don't make enough to afford to go to the doctor. Medicaid pays for that.
There is a ton of ridiculous costs with health care, and half the price could be eliminated if someone like Musk went in there slashing and burning, but until we fix the private medical industry we still have to not let people die for lack of a doctor.
So we are stuck with the three imperfect programs, and there are lobbyists and campaign donations going to both parties.
True enough. The system is necessary but broken. If we can ever get our fiscal house in order (ha), we could fix some of that and set up a parallel system to replace SS for new entrants.
Like Trump, I oppose cutting the benefits of Social Security and Medicare. Both programs are afflicted with bad design and I never would have done it that way. To be fair, FDR didn't want it that way either. He wanted something like individual accounts but his veto was overridden. However, here we are and many people depend on those programs to have any sort of retirement at all. They acted in good faith and were taxed to provide those benefits. The only way you can get out of that trap is to run a new system in parallel with the old one with any new entrants going into the old system. However, that is very expensive and can't happen until some of the other problems are solved. There is some room to cut expenditures by targeting fraud. It the case of Medicare, that is provider fraud. In the case of SS, it is to be found in the disability portion of the program and not so much in the retirement part.
Don't fall into the Paul Ryan heresy and conflate Medicaid with the other two. Medicaid is pure welfare.
Medicaid is the final backstop, the last resort for medical care for many millions of Americans. Cut it and many will suffer, and struggling hospitals (especially in rural areas) will finally give up the ghost. It is without question ‘welfare’ but aside from letting people get sick and die there doesn’t seem to be an alternative.
Agreed but it is different from the others two. I can think of a number of policy issues that would improve it while the other two have a contractual basis. (I know what the Supreme Court said but this is the same institution that said that free blacks aren't citizens. ). The issue that links the three is fraud and that should be addressed first. Supposedly Elon's war band has found billions in payments to the same SS number or to no number at all. Then hammer some sleazy providers in both Medicare and Medicaid. Then see if we need policy changes.
I don't doubt there is SSI fraud. People claiming a back problem and getting scrips for oxy. But we still need the program. Workers comp doesn't cover everything, and for kids orphaned or wives widowed it can be a godsend.
Similarly with Medicaid. For old people Medicare only covers a couple months in the hospital, then after you sell everything you own except the house Medicaid will pay for the nursing home until you die, and then when your widow dies they take the money from selling the house.
Currently our personal health insurance which covers just about everything is valued at around $36,000 on our W2, and we pay no taxes on that money. Most people where I live, our health insurance is about the same as their income. Poor people, or even people who work full time but don't make much money, they simply don't make enough to afford to go to the doctor. Medicaid pays for that.
There is a ton of ridiculous costs with health care, and half the price could be eliminated if someone like Musk went in there slashing and burning, but until we fix the private medical industry we still have to not let people die for lack of a doctor.
So we are stuck with the three imperfect programs, and there are lobbyists and campaign donations going to both parties.
True enough. The system is necessary but broken. If we can ever get our fiscal house in order (ha), we could fix some of that and set up a parallel system to replace SS for new entrants.