Social Security Investments Called a Start - Thomas wants Medicare chg

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-social19jan19,1,5154637.story?coll=la-headlines-nation&ctrack=2&cset=true
THE NATION
Social Security Investments Called a Start
A GOP House panel chairman talks of revisions in Medicare, women's benefits and payroll tax. Democrats denounce the proposal.
By Joel Havemann and Richard Simon
Times Staff Writers

January 19, 2005

WASHINGTON — Converting some Social Security benefits into private investment accounts isn't enough for Rep. Bill Thomas (R-Bakersfield). The chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee said Tuesday that he wanted to take on Medicare benefits, the payroll tax and Social Security benefits for women at the same time.

Thomas' committee will deal with the proposal, which President Bush plans to include in his budget next month, to divert some of the Social Security payroll tax into private accounts. In a symposium sponsored by the National Journal, Thomas said Congress had a rare chance to consider a wide range of looming problems together and develop something more than a piecemeal approach.<snip>

The payroll tax discourages hiring, Thomas said, and, in remarks to reporters after the symposium, he hinted at the possibility of scrapping it in favor of an income tax or at least of lowering the tax rate and increasing the cap on the wages on which the tax is levied.

It also would be smart, Thomas said, to consider revisions to Medicare at the same time. Contending that Medicare's costs were growing much faster than Social Security's, he suggested that savings for long-term care would be more coherent if they accompanied general retirement savings.<snip>