"Grave Medicare Ills Await Attention" (Your propaganda for the day)

WASHINGTON (AP) - A looming Medicare shortage is seven times the size of the one that Social Security faces and nearly four times the entire federal debt. It is not being addressed by President Bush and Congress, and, to some, that is just as well.

Social Security, which Bush has hoisted atop his domestic agenda, is $3.7 trillion short of what it will need for benefits over the next 75 years, under the latest federal projections. Medicare, the health care program for the elderly, must find an estimated $27.8 trillion.

By 2018, Social Security is on track to start paying more annually to recipients than it collects in payroll taxes - an ominous tipping point that Medicare reached last year.

While Social Security is expected to exhaust its reserves in 2042, Medicare should deplete the trust fund financing its hospital benefits in 2019, the latest forecasts show.

http://apnews1.iwon.com/article/20050302/D88IJBEG0.html