AND MEDICARE is NOT allowed to negotiate drug prices , unlike TRICARE etc ...

Please help me. If you are affected by IRMMA you have an adjusted (after deductions) income of either $88000 as an individual or $170000 married filing jointly. Again as I previously posted only 7% of all seniors collecting SS fall into that category. I know a whole lot of seniors that would like to have your financial problem.

My point is it is an unjust penalty for years of hard work, deferred gratification, prudent savings and investment success. It is like having to pay $15 for a $5 Big Mac.

Especially if it takes the high school kid with no experience 1 hour of his time to make it:1rotfl::1rotfl::1rotfl:

January 1, 2006, is when Medicare Plan D went into effect.

Before that, there was no drug coverage under Medicare.

Although I was not yet to Medicare age, I knew how health insurance worked — or didn’t — because for years I had been part of a contract negotiations team. Health insurance coverage was always a big part of those negotiations.

I was at that negotiations table for most of the 1990s, and well into this century, whenever contract time rolled around. I witnessed a lot of changes during those years.

(When the drug card came in, I thought it could turn out to be a Trojan Horse. But everybody wanted one — and damn, I was right.

Those drug cards contributed to skyrocketing drug costs because the card made it so nobody paid much attention to cost as long as the coverage was there.

Before the drug cards, we paid upfront for our prescriptions, kept the receipts, and sent them in for reimbursement. I cannot imagine doing that now. The chunk of money it would cost before reimbursement would trash a lot of budgets. But ooooooh — those drug cards sure were welcomed in to be “celebrated” — just like that Trojan Horse.)

When Plan D was implemented for Medicare in 2006, although I was not there yet, I remember when it happened and I remember what I thought at the time.

Thought 1: I thought — and think — Plan D is a good thing because before that, there was no drug coverage for those on Medicare and there were people going without needed prescriptions or splitting what they could afford into smaller dosages — not as prescribed — to make the pills “last longer.”

Thought 2: At the time it happened, I remember saying, “Ya know, although it’s a good thing to have drug coverage for those on Medicare — that sure seemed to get through into law — FAST. Somebody is in bed with the drug companies. And now drug companies hold all the cards and costs are insane. And please spare me the pipeline mantra. Sure, it’s there and it is important, but that’s not where all of it goes. Profit is OK, of course, but c’mon. Geez.

Cassandra Boomer

"The horrifying source of the increase relates to Aduhelm, the new Alzheimer’s drug estimated to cost $56,000 a year. While the process is still under way to determine whether and how Medicare will cover Aduhelm, CMS decided to increase “contingency reserves” to cover possible significantly higher expenditures in the future.

As an aside, the reason that Aduhelm falls under Part B instead of Part D is that it is administered in physicians’ offices rather than purchased at a pharmacy. One implication of being under Part B is that traditional enrollees have to pick up 20% of the cost of most Part B medications, which would translate into about $11,200 in out-of-pocket costs for those prescribed Aduhelm.

So where does this enormous increase in premiums leave Social Security beneficiaries after they pay the higher premium? An individual currently receiving $1,600 a month (the approximate average retiree benefit) will see benefits go up by $94 from the COLA, but pay $22 more in Medicare premiums, resulting in a net increase of $72 or 4.5% of the original benefit amount. Thus, while the Part B increase does not eliminate the COLA, it seriously erodes its inflation protection."

From: Opinion: Government announces surprising hike in Medicare Part B premiums - MarketWatch

EXCEPT-------It takes over $800 million from first idea to manufacture to bring a new drug to market, and the largest cost is FEDERAL RED TAPE and the resulting hoops to jump through. Safer, probably, but way more expensive. The part I object to is the drug companies spreading that $ 800M only over the domestic market, and then selling the same pills abroad at a substantially lower price. We are subsidizing the rest of the world, when in all fairness, the rest of the world should be paying us for our research and innovation

Excellent article on Medicare hikes.

Opinion: Government announces surprising hike in Medicare Part B premiums - MarketWatch

I heard about this the other day. It's outrageous! With the government, one hand gives, the other takes away. But I'm miffed because they purposely misled us because at first there was no mention of an increase in Medicare costs, only about the big SS benefits increase. However, how you're affected for both increases depends on what your SS benefit is, as not everyone gets the same, and also what your supplemental Part B insurance coverage is, as that isn't the same for everyone either.

Originally Posted by rmd2 View Post
I just got my new Social Security statement for 2022. My monthly Social Security decreased $10 from $121 to $111 and my monthly Medicare payment increased from $208 to $238 for a total loss this coming year of $40 a month. And EVERYTHING has gone up in price!

You sure you didn’t leave out a zero on your SS benefits? If that’s accurate I sure hope you get pension or have a nest egg

I do have a pension but those numbers are correct for SS because at that time I was a low earner for my 40 quarters of work. On top of that Congress cut our SS by 60% so I will NEVER recoup what I put into SS. If I could have taken the SS payments I made and invested them in the S&P index I would have been WAY ahead.

YES!! :thumbup:

3 card monte
 

government $ promises etc.
A wise man once said.
" figures dont lie
but
liars know how to figure.
If at our ages we don't know it's been a con game all along,
we never will.
The president said " afghanistan cost us 300 million per day"
and that money went to who? For over 20 years.

For most drugs a big percentage of the 800 mil (or whatever it is for a particular drug) is funded by the government (us!) so don't cry for the poor pharmaceutical companies just yet. Often the biggest expense they foot is for marketing costs.
Here is a link since some insist on one - Taxpayers — not Big Pharma — have funded the research behind every new drug since 2010 | Other98

Yes, unfortunately we pay for the R&D, and pay the high price for the drugs. Then ,for example, our “friend” Canada, told us a number of years ago, that if we didn’t charge them the same price that “poor” countries were paying, like Mexico, that they would make the drugs themselves. It didn’t make sense to me that they could circumvent Intellectual Property agreements, but apparently they could, and that’s why you can get drugs from Canada cheaper than here.

Much of the rest of the world is riding on our benevolent backs. For poor countries I have no problem with that. It’s the countries that should share in the benevolence that is troubling.

Only if you have been on social security disability for 24 months.