Paul Ryan's Plan Will Ration Health Care by Ability to Pay Even More Than It Already Is.

Even today, the elderly have considerable out of pocket expense when it comes to health care. I know my retired parents pay $800 per month (I think...I just know it's a hell of a lot more than they should have to pay) for health care insurance, in addition to Medicare coverage. And, now Medicare (government sponsored single payer health care system for the approximately 47 million elderly) may be eliminated entirely if deficit-cutting, supply-sider, Representative Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, gets his way.

Ryan's plan relies on vouchers - which the federal contribution will be pegged to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) - that future retirees can use to buy private health insurance. Here's the thing: the inflation rate of healthcare expenses (and private insurance costs) rises three times faster than the CPI.  The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that by 2030, retirees will pay 68%  out of pocket, compared with the 25% the elderly  pay now.  Not to mention, those retiring in  ten years, will- if the current trend continues - have very little to no savings at all.

We often hear that demographics, or the growth of the aging population is what's responsible for driving health care costs sky-high.  Not so, says health care economist Uwe Reinhardt of Princeton University. He claims that the growth in the aging population (occurs at a glacial pace) only accounts for one-half of one percent of the 6% inflation rate of healthcare expenses (and private insurance costs). So, what drives the cost?
The supply side of the health care system. That's right, the private sector (physicians, especially specialists, hospitals, pharmaceuticals, etc.), who continue to increase prices. Americans pay twice the amount for everything from doctor visits to medicine, than every other country.

Now Ryan will lie to tell  you that he has the same type of health care insurance. This is not true, as his plan is not pegged to the CPI; the federal contributions in his plan keep pace with the inflation rate of healthcare costs.

On the critical metric of whether the Ryan plan would reduce total health-care costs [] the CBO conclusion is shocking: The plan would not only fail to decrease health-care costs per beneficiary, it would increase them — by an astonishingly large amount that grows over time. By 2030, health spending on the typical beneficiary would be more than 40 percent higher under the Ryan plan than under existing Medicare, according to the CBO report.

....How could this possibly be, when the point of reform is to reduce costs? The CBO points to two factors: Private plans have higher administrative costs than the federal Medicare program, and less negotiating leverage with providers-- Peter Orszag

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As Debt Increases, Freedoms Decrease; Hence Our Indentured Sevitude.

John Adams once stated, "There are two ways to enslave a nation. One is by the sword. The other is by debt." And Benjamin Franklin said, "Think what you do when you run in debt; you give to another power over your liberty." And that's where we are. Right where Alexis de Toqueville predicted when he said, "The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money.”

However, having said that, it's not always easy to see the leaves of freedom shriveling and falling to the ground when you are embedded deeply in a forest of debt, especially when that debt serves as the foundation of the economy.  In other words, debt is not a choice, despite all the effort that goes into making each and everyone of us believe that it is.

Right out of the gate, in order to get ahead, most of us must steep ourselves in debt, because without a college education, starting a career is next to impossible. Then, after graduation, it takes anywhere from 10-years to sometimes as much as an entire lifetime to pay this debt off. And, that's just the very beginning of the albatross of debt most people can expect to accumulate over an American lifetime.

The bottom line is that people are slaves to their debt. We're so conditioned into believing debt is as natural as the air we breathe that it's very hard to think of ourselves as indentured servants, but, that's exactly what most of us are.

That's why it's so egregious that President Obama would even consider what White House fiscal commission co-chairs Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson - in favor of brutalizing the middle class while being favorable to the very wealthy - had the nerve to offer as a debt reduction plan:  a proposal that cuts Social Security, in addition to Medicare, Medicaid, and anything else that might possibly offer relief to middle-class America. So, now, every source of retirement income is under siege.   Social Security, personal savings, occupational pensions, including Medicare for retirees,  are potentially up for grabs. Not to mention, Medicaid, that if cut, will leave millions vulnerable to  catastrophic illness costs. In fact, Arizona is already denying organ transplants to people on Medicaid.

Here's the thing. They have no right to touch Social Security. Why?  Well, despite all of the attempts to associate Social Security with the federal budget, it's important to note that Social Security is not part of the federal budget. It is a separate account, a trust, which is funded from our contributions, through payroll taxes. SS has not added one dime to the national debt. The program's payouts have never exceeded revenues, that is, until last year...for the very first time.

Moreover, the  powers that be have plundered SS to fund their destructive agendas for decades. If left alone, the Social Security Trust Fund has a surplus of $2.6 trillion and is expected to remain solvent in its current form until 2037, according to its trustees report.  That's why the tax deal the president struck with Senate Republicans last month that includes a one-year cut in the payroll tax – the source of Social Security's funding – from 6.2% to 4.2% is a little suspicious.  

Only mass outrage can stop the slashing of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other social programs. Meanwhile, as usual, Wall Street is raking in the profits at our expense, even though they continue to torment the innocent, and continue the same practices that initially caused the economic collapse in the first place.

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Obama Flips Social Security Off Again.

Okay, if I know that Social Security has nothing to do with the $1.4 trillion deficit or the $13.8 trillion debt, President Obama certainly knows. In fact, he knows the SS surplus has funded President budgets for decades! Why? Because, once again, I know, and I'm not exactly the brightest bird in the flock.  I didn't even have to look it up...I just knew.

Yet, despite his obvious intelligence,  he continues to make statements like the following:

"Actually, I think that if you talk to economists, both conservative and liberal, what they'll say is the problem is not next year. The problem is, how are we dealing with our medium-term debt and deficit, and how are we dealing with our long-term debt and deficit? And most of that has to do with entitlements, particularly Social Security and Medicaid." - President Obama

You see, Social Security and Medicare represent the last vestige of an American society governed by the people and for the people...or at least, as much as that statement has ever held any truth. Therefore, they remain the targets of the Republican demolition squad. Why? Because to completely unravel the remaining tattered threads of the people’s “safety net" - those same threads that former President Roosevelt’s New Deal and former President Johnson’s Great Society wove together that created a network to cushion the blows that can result from occurrences beyond our control - completes their agenda to eliminate protection for the people.  But, President Obama is not a Republican. He is a Democrat...one, who promised he would work on behalf of the people for a change.

He knows we the people are already suffering from an economy that has devastated our savings, home values and retirement security, so why is he  trying to impose measures aimed at cutting working-class living standards? And falsely citing Social Security and Medicare as the biggest problems in dealing with the long-term debt and deficit? Especially, when it's not true.  Moreover, why has President Obama tried to put Social Security on the chopping block (Conrad-Gregg Commission) from the moment he took office?

Anyway, here's the truth: The $1.4 trillion deficit nor the nearly $13.8 trillion debt have anything to do with SS. SS has taken in more revenue each year than it has paid out in benefits for the last 30-years. The excess revenue has been invested in U.S. government securities that the federal government "borrows" from to spend on other things.

Yet, despite the innocence and contribution of social security, increasing the retirement age to 69, making citizens work longer so they pay more into the system, and then, in turn, giving them less when they retire, ranks up there as one of top solutions offered at the expense of the American public.

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Medicare Health and Prescription Drug Plan Tracker Updated With 2008 Data

The Kaiser Family Foundation monitors changes in private plans in Medicare, and displays them on this interactive online Medicare Health and Prescription Drug Plan Tracker including 2009 data.

The tracker provides local, regional and national information about Medicare Advantage plans, including types of plans available and premium levels, and much of this information can be mapped for all 50 states or plotted over time. A separate paper also examines special needs plans under Medicare Advantage.

Statehealthfacts.org is also a project of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and is designed to provide free, up-to-date, and easy-to-use health data on all 50 states and provides data on more than 500 health topics.

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Can We Edit Out the Catch-22s From Policy?

What if we, the people were to create a small independent committee who's only job is to edit all policy for catch-22s that render so much of civil administration ineffective for the sole purpose of making sure the immense imbalance between the elite and the people remain in tact? We can call it the Catch-22 Policy Patrol. The committee members will be reformed neocons who are experts in paradoxical, circular reasoning that can make the most absurd "logic" appear rational.

A Real Life Example

Trudy Lieberman, director of the Health and Medical Reporting Program at the Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY wrote a series in the Columbia Journalism Review about the candidate's health plans and how they might affect ordinary people across the nation.

In part II, Lieberman covered the story of a relatively healthy 62-year old father and his sickly 43-year old son. The father works two jobs as the county’s head jailer, and as a grill cook at McDonalds, earning approximately $30,000 per year. His health insurance pays 70% of a bill. He pays the remaining 30%, in addition to paying copays and premiums. He cannot afford to add his 44-year old wife.

His son is a diabetic, who has trouble breathing, talking, walking...he has no job, no money and no insurance. He can't afford medical care, the insulin and the test strips he needs to control his blood sugars. In fact, he can't even afford the transportation it would take to get medical care. Luckily, Abbott Laboratories was willing to give him free strips as long as he applied for Medicaid and was rejected.

"Getting to a doctor regularly, though, is problematic. “I don’t have any money to take him,” says his father. “I’m just broke.” What spare cash he once had, he used to send his youngest daughter to college. Still, he was planning to use eighty dollars from the $570 paycheck he would get the next day to buy test strips for his son to tide him over until Abbott’s supply arrived."

Where is the Catch-22?

Well, Arkansas has a program where you could become eligible for Medicaid (Medicaid for the medically needy program) by spending down. The way it works is after a person accumulates a certain amount in medical bills, he or she may be able to qualify for this program. The catch is he or she must have the money upfront to pay the medical bills in order to accumulate them. If a he or she can't afford transportation, how in the world can he afford to pay doctor bills?

In addition, if you can navigate through all the "catch-22's" involved in qualifying for SSDI, he or she must wait an additional two years for Medicare. At that rate, why not sponsor hunting programs, and hire sharp shooters to thin the "herd" of Medicaid recipients once a year?

Aside from the numerous catch-22s incorporated into our system of health care, and anything and every program designed to help the less fortunate, we are learning that paradoxical laws written with confusing rhetoric designed to trap its victims in no win situations, does not only apply to the poor, but to we, the "average" people as well, which is becoming more apparent every day.

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