Let's assume the following article is true (with a tolerance of minus zero and plus 5 years) just for the sake of discussion:

http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/articl...ty-health-care

Medicare has been touted by any number of our representatives, to "go broke" in less than a decade.

And the organization that is responsible for the ongoing operation of the above...the federal government.

Knowing the above, how can anybody in Washington address health care reform without addressing these harbingers of the future?

What am I missing?

btk

Not a thing. Any representative who supports a new government run boondoggle called health care without first resolving Social Security and Medicare is irresponsible and should not be re-elected. They are touting that they can save 500 billion on Medicare and use it to help fund health care. If that is true and has not been done, again they are at fault. Fix what is currently broke, show the public they (SS & MC) can be run successfully, and we might be more supportive of health care. With the current track record of almost all government run programs failing or way over budget, no one should be behind these new plans.

If you worked for any business and everything you did either had major cost over runs or was failing, would you be given a new major program to run? No. You would be fired. If not fired, at a minimum be forced to come up with a plan to fix the broke programs, demonstrate success, then just maybe given something more.

Even Obama fired the GM CEO. Why? Because he failed. He should either do the same or fix current programs in trouble. And start with Medicare and Social Security. Why can't the general public see that?

Originally Posted by l2ridehd

Not a thing. Any representative who supports a new government run boondoggle called health care without first resolving Social Security and Medicare is irresponsible and should not be re-elected. They are touting that they can save 500 billion on Medicare and use it to help fund health care. If that is true and has not been done, again they are at fault. Fix what is currently broke, show the public they (SS & MC) can be run successfully, and we might be more supportive of health care. With the current track record of almost all government run programs failing or way over budget, no one should be behind these new plans.

If you worked for any business and everything you did either had major cost over runs or was failing, would you be given a new major program to run? No. You would be fired. If not fired, at a minimum be forced to come up with a plan to fix the broke programs, demonstrate success, then just maybe given something more.

Even Obama fired the GM CEO. Why? Because he failed. He should either do the same or fix current programs in trouble. And start with Medicare and Social Security. Why can't the general public see that?

In a couple of other threads I've said that all of the alleged problems in health care delivery, the auto industry debacle and a couple others all tied back to the economy. The Bachus interview reinforces that position.

When LBJ and others started raiding the Social Security Trust Fund, trading cash for gov't IOUs, Social Security started having to depend on Contributions-in/Payments-out methodology. So, here we are with a greying American work force (for several reasons), a downward-spiral in domestic manufacturing and intellectual services (thanks to lousy foreign policy decisions) and the result is an unemployment rate at double what it was five years ago.

If the number of unemployed goes from roughly 4.5% to 9%, you've cut out one-in-19 who has been paying into the SS Fund (which runs from hand-to-mouth). Simple math says that SS contributions are now cut by roughly 5.5% while payments increase with each new SS retiree. That means the SS Trust (what's left of it) has to make up the difference (as we have run out of IOUs).

While I don't like the man, he was right when he said, "It's the economy, stupid!" When the economy is strong, there is no "health care crisis," or Social Security degeneration, or concern about the cost of ongoing wars, or even any care about illegal immigration. With a strong economy we can afford it all, and attempt to get to the moon or Mars.

Until we fix the economy by giving domestic manufacturers and intellectual service providers the breaks necessary to compete in the domestic market with the countries we have given "most favored trading partner" status, our economy still heads downhill like a bobsled at St. Moritz. The recent unofficial devaluing of the dollar by just printing up a couple trillion more Washingtons was like giving uppers to a dying man - the short term euphoria doesn't make it all better..

Originally Posted by billethkid

...how can anybody in Washington address health care reform without addressing these harbingers of the future?...What am I missing?...

It's not totally clear that Medicare is badly managed. Those of us that use it as our primary insurance probably have few if any complaints about the insurance as it affects us as users.

As a "business" the story is different. Basically, what's happened, I think, is that Medicare has been managed in a way where the revenues have not been permitted to keep up with the rate that costs have increased. It seems to me that the refusal to increase premiums to cover increased costs has been purely a political one. Congress has enacted the series of patchwork bills to fund Medicare on a year-to-year basis, taking as much as they could from the doctors and hospitals who provide the service and skirting the outrage from the public that would occur if they increased premiums to make the "business" break-even. Basically, Congress has funded an increasingly-used Medicare insurance business by "borrowing" from the future by not replenishing the funds set aside to run the program over a long term as needed.

The problem with Medicare is with the initial legislation that created it, which had limitations in requiring the automatic scaling up of premiums and funding as the population aged, as U.S. life expectancies lengthened, and as usage of the system increased. That lead to the need for the series of almost annual "fix-up bills" that Congress has had to pass to keep Medicare at least marginally solvent.

What's scary about this story is that we may be on the precipice of doing something similar again. With the intense partisanship which seems to be driving the creation of the 2009 healthcare reforms, it seems to me that there's a great risk that again we will create a Rube Goldberg bill, which will have as little chance of long-term success as the original Medicare. Remember, the original Medicare was created by legislation by a Congress that was nearly as fractionalized as it is today. The bill passed by a narrow margin, with lots of amendments, and only because of the intervention of a politically savvy and skillful POTUS. If something passes this year, the underlying situation will be quite similar.

The situation sure seems to call the question: are we about to make all those same mistakes again? Add in the issues that SteveZ notes above and we have the potential of a real witch's brew of a healthcare bill. Legislation is clearly needed, but will Congress and the administration have the cajones to learn from the past and do it right this time?

Oh, why did I ask that last question? Congress is not going to look ahead any further than the 2010 and 2012 elections and their next big campaign contribution. Why should we expect anything different? I can't imagine that this is the system that the founding fathers had in mind.

"The situation sure seems to call the question: are we about to all those same mistakes again? Add in the issues that SteveZ notes above and we have the potential of a real witch's brew of a healthcare bill."
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I do not think for one nano second that we are not going to make those same mistakes and many new ones to boot.

This President, as voiced by many many of his advisors, wants this to firm up his "legacy", so no matter what, we will have a health care bill, and it will be whatever will pass. It does not matter if those opposed make good points or even if those in his own party make good points, there is GOING TO BE A HEALTHCARE BILL and it will be whatever it takes to get the votes and nothing else.

It will be pronounced as a wonderful thing for the less than 10% of americans who are uninusred and we will be told not to worry about how it is to be paid for...we are going to cut costs and you dont have to worry about the details !