Medicare is not free!

Precisely correct! The so called Social Security trust fund is simply ink on paper. There is nothing actually there.

And liek HermitJohn said, most elderly people just died when they got cancer, pneumonia, etc. Now they are rushed into the hospital and live 2, 3, 4 years and then die, often after multi-millions of dollars are spent.

This is turning into anothe example of the 'tragedy of the commons'

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"Ever since LBJ the SS surplus has gone into the general fund for congress to buy votes with. The SS administration was given IOU's for this surplus. Even if some or all of the IOU's were in the form of government bonds, so what? In case you haven't noticed the government is 14 TRILLION dollars in debt and borrowing more ever minute. That 14 TRILLION doesn't include unfunded obligations such as SS, medicare, retirement for military and other government employees and many other government promises. Estimates range over 100 TRILLION dollars in unfunded liabilities before Obamacare is added to the mix. The only way to pay this is with more borrowing or printing more paper dollars. The US is bankrupt.""


not true, in 1993 congress enacted a bill to stop raiding SS and in 2003 GW begged them to raid it again and they did

There's no free lunch with any govt. program.

The govt. has no magic reserves of funds set aside in magic fairy dust accounts (contrary to the vast majority of American's opinions, that it's 'their' money, set aside, and they're going to start withdrawing it). What goes in today, goes out nano-seconds later, to others... what isn't sent to China, Japan, and elsewhere, to pay for our welfare payments.

Have zero faith SS will be around when I'm "eligible"... of course, by then, the minimum retirement age might be 80.

If it were up to me, Medicare would be a zero sum game. Recipients would pay 100% of the cost, divided up equally amongst all users.

..........wondering how long this thread will survive, outside of General Chat.......

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Please provide a link to that info. Because here is a link from CNN business that says that 2.5 trillion SS receipts have been "borrowed" and spent since 1983. This year more is being paid out than collected. IF the economy improves next year it may be in the black again, for a few more years. Sure, government bonds (IOU's) are in the SSA filing cabinet, but how will the government be able to buy them back? Will they just print the trillions they need?

http://money.cnn.com/2010/08/05/news...port/index.htm

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Well stated, FarmerGreen.

If people haven't yet awakened to the fact that the country is financially (and in many cases, morally) bankrupt, they'll discover that sad fact eventually.

It's the greed of the One Party System that got us into this mess. I don't know what -- other than divine intervention -- will get us out.

@Texican: TANSTAAFL, indeed. People never learn. <sigh>

I'm not a bettin' woman, but I think we can keep this out of GC for a while longer.

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I have posted many times SS is Not Broke. And here is the Truth. It is a Myth like I have been trying to tell ya all.
It is just Politics and nothing more from Both Parties.

Notice the Date this was just written in June.


http://www.seniorcitizenjournal.com/...cial-security/

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They sourced their info in your article from Moveon.org. Even lefties consider it heavily biased.

True, to a point. The govt. cannot go broke. It just pays it's bills by printing more money. Voila! Problem solved.

Btw... anyone that believes SS isn't a ponzi scheme (and therefore unsustainable), I'd like to invite you to an IPO (Initial Public Offering) of my latest get rich quick and it's perfectly above board and honest as the day is long scheme, er, uh... I mean Business, yeah, Business. I'm selling breeding pairs of unicorns, for a mere 10K each. Special unicorn horn supplement is available if you wish extra long horns... Get in while the getting is good.

(I know people that fall for every ponzi scheme that comes along... they lose a couple thousand, say they'll never get robbed again, and of course, another scheme that sounds too good to fail comes along, and they fall for it too. Oh, and they believe in SS too. Amazing!!!)

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well, is SS broke or not?? Is the sky falling in yet? What happens with Iran and North Korea in the next decade??
I hear Cuba has the best health insurance and medicare program around. It's free. Any truth to this??

I haven't read all the postings but the one thing I am sure of is that SS and Medicare were never intended to be the primary support of the elderly - they were to be supplementary to your own retirement or savings.

The real problem is the baby boomer generation was so huge that they could generate enough income for the previous generation. Unfortunately, there are way to many BBs for them to continue to use SS as the primary income and insurance.

Yes, it sucks, but it doesn't change the math. I always felt I was supporting my grandparents with my input to SS and Medicare. Its not anything I ever expected to get back and I still don't. At this point I am paying to support my parents, I suppose.

don't need links, I have a memory


it's funny how people do not remember again thing that ever happens in this world and believe what ever some idiot ____ people bull ___ about on tv or online


http://budget.senate.gov/democratic/...rust020703.pdf

I thought we were having a serious discussion. My grandkids could come up with a better chart than that. Did a real senator actually use that? Must've been one from CA.

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Only for current participants. New enrollees are being charged $115/mo.

DH has been getting all his meds, but one, for $4 @ Walmart. The one exception, Plavix, he's been getting through Squibb's PAP....which ends when his Medicare coverage kicks in next month.

I thought I had the system outsmarted when I found mail order generics from Canada that would have been affordable. Then I learned about the penalty for delaying to sign up for Part D.

But overall, I'm not seeing any advantage to Part D coverage.

Why would you be willing to allow yourself to be robbed like that? Why on earth would you continue to have your hard-earned money taken with no expectation of any returns?

When you pay money for a loaf of bread, are you willing to go home empty-handed?

India has some of the best medical care in the world. Don't know about Thailand.

I am one of the old geezers, but I certainly see the side of the young people.

It is a cruel hoax on both - the young and the old. To my knowledge, there is no health insurance for older people. Thanks to government involvement in healthcare, the price has gotten out of reach for almost everyone - so that's leaves older people the option of using Medicare or dying.

One of the suggestions from the 'bring down the deficit' committee is to not allow the medigap policies to pay the first $500. It seems they believe that old people are abusing the system and if they must pay the first $500, in other words, no first dollar coverage, they won't abuse it. I'm appalled they put it as the old people were abusing the system. I don't think the abuse could be done without the aid of a doctor or other healthcare provider. Old people don't just check themselves into a hospital, do their own surgery, and bill Medicare.

Also, why is Medicare lumped with Medicaid in the government pie chart I saw? They are two different things. Is it the government wants everyone to think Medicare is somehow the same as welfare? Is it the government is trying to hide the amount of money paid out in Medicaid? Is it they don't want people to understand just how much the illegals are costing us in medical care? Is it they want the young people to be upset with the elderly rather than the welfare/illegals?

I understand the frustration of younger people with the price of medicare for the elderly. What I don't understand is why that same group aren't upset about the care of the illegals. Think about the cost of birthing babies - that alone must be tremendous for the illegals.

With the price of healthcare today, I'm not sure how anyone can have enough put back to pay for medical care when they are older. Simple things are very expensive - cataract surgery comes to mind.

Why don't we demand more oversight into the government programs anyway. In other words, ferret out the healthcare abusers and punish them. Confiscate their ill gotten gains and put it back into the government programs? Try a few money saving things like reusing medical equipment.

Why don't we demand research to see if there is a connection between our foods, toxins in water and air that is causing some of the problems.

I have been doing some reading about a possible connection between aspartame and cataracts. Why wouldn't it be worth it to find out? We have plenty of human research subjects. Just go through the population and get information and put it all together. Maybe the doctor could simply suggest people get off aspartame for a while and see if their eyesight improves - mine did. One person's experience does not make it a fact, but wouldn't it be cost effective to actually find out? What if it only worked in half the cases?

I'm going to flip another side of the coin into the equation here.

Both my husband and myself are as they say, no spring chickens anymore. 60 is looming in the near distance and it makes me nervous as to what if any money is going to be out there that we have paid in all our lives towards our own medicare.

On a personal/professional twist. Medical professionals are being told to expect a 23% cut in their medicare reimbursements sometime in the near future. It was supposed to go into effect this year, now we hear it is next year. Who knows when they are going to do it for sure but the word is out there. So every doctor who submits medicare claims is going to have to do without 23% of whatever 80 % of approved charges that they submit for a patient.

It may not sound like much, but writing that much off each service performed is a bigger hit to doctors than you realize with today's rising costs of operation.

Be warned. You may be faced with a challenge to find a doctor in your old age who is willing to take any new medicare patients in the future IF this happens. You can expect a good amount to simply quit taking them.

I wish that there was an easy answer to all of it. There isn't. Maybe the Amish have the right idea, they don't pay into it and the community takes care of their own.....wouldn't be such a bad way to live if it wasn't for no TV and having to learn Pennsylvania Dutch!

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Hmmmm. I am looking at the new mailer that I just got for next year.
And No Changes at all in mine, for what Medicare takes out. It is still the same at $96.50.
So could the added cost be a higher Schedule D drug Coverage? Or in some cases are taxes taken out?
I have a Medicare Advantage Program (Humana), and pay each month from a payment book, so nothing is deducted from my SS Check, other then for Medicare Medical Coverage itself.

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==> Too funny! $97 a month for health insurance at the ripe old age of 65? I would say that is a steal! Ask the average healthy 20 year old if they can get full coverage health insurance for that price......


Me - 41. She - 39 (both smokers, but otherwise healthy (we both just ran a full 26 mile marathon last year to celebrate my 40th), no kids).

Anyway ours is $857 / month (combined - for the both of us) and going up by 15-20%(ish) each and every year. It's a bit pricey as it's a "cadilac plan". The base plans are still $550 to $600 a month.


I paid off the house and thought I'd be able to retire early. No way. No how. Just traded the house payment for the monthly insurance bill. At least the house payment was static and never really went up (a few bucks here and there when property taxes went up) -- the danged insurance bill just keeps going up ... and up ... and up -- for another 25 years until we don't get to collect from bankrupt Medicare.

No, it stated in our letter that those who were already enrolled would not see an increase in their premiums this year (2011) but new enrollees are being charged the new, higher premium.

Can't find any explanation for the discrepancy, but it sure don't seem fair.

I've been pouring over the handbook and internet all day trying to compare health/drug plans. If I thought we wouldn't get caught in the middle of legislation, I'd say to heck with it and just order DHs meds from Canada. But Washington is working very hard to close that loophole, too.