GAO chief warns economic disaster looms

that things are not going to get better....

Just goddam means test for social security and medicare.

1. Is there any reason in the world why taxpayers should be paying the health care costs of people who can easily, easily purchase private insurance???!!!

2. Is there any reason why, if a senior has both Medicare and can afford private insurance, the private insurer shouldn't be required to pay FIRST, and let Medicare pay any deductible??!!

3. Is there any reason why people of ample resources who will never need the paltry amount of monthly Social Security pension couldn't, on retirement age, simply be refunded their investment plus interest and not receive a monthly check??!! Most people receive far more Social Security payout than they ever paid in. Rich people shouldn't get that freebie from the taxpayers.

There's more, but just those three steps would save it all for those who truly need it.

And don't start with that yada yada about means testing. We means test welfare programs. We means test student loans. We means test MANY DIFFERENT programs.

The problem is that the appeal of programs like Medicare is that they are universal.

Welfare got eviscerated because it was perceived as a program where productive citizens had to take money out of their pockets to pay undeserving and lazy bums. Because of the resentment in that stereotype, the baby got thrown out with the bathwater with welfare reform, and now there is much less of a safety net for those who truly need it.

Same thing would happen to Medicare if it became just a source of health care for those who are below some arbitrary income level. Resentments against it would rise, and it would most likely be taken away entirely, or limited so much that only the poorest of the poor would be eligable.

It would also likely cause regular health insutrance rates to skyrocket, if private insurers had to become the first insurers of the sick and elderly and pick up that burden.

There may be cuts and trims and compromises necessary, but if the basic nature of these systems were to be fundamentally changed to the detrement of the middle (and yes the upper) class. It would become a new bonanza for the Republicans too.

If people really understood that the safety nets that are in place for grandma are being threatened by the programs that deliver unconscionable profits to the drug companies and insurance companies, public opinion would shift dramatically.

The people have the power to change this. Someone has to tell them what it's really all about. Someone has to say that it's greedy for a wealthy person to allow taxpayers to borrow from China so that future generations will pay their medical bills and give them a couple thousand dollars every month.

Republicans, of course, WANT the programs to go bankrupt.

if insurance companies were not cherry picking those they will insure. We could afford insurance on my hubby but he had a heart attack 7 years ago at age 44 and no one will insure him at any price. His previous carrier pulled out of the state and canceled him. A hospitalization would wipe us out.

Shared risk oughta mean shared risk. We need regulatory reform.

they don't mandate that EVERYONE should be eligible for health insurance, not just healthy people. Both Democratic and Republican proposals tend to neglect this issue.

And there would be no Medicare which is the only health program based on the notion that health care is a right. We've decided that's true for the elderly and if we means test it, we go backwards on health care for all. The solution actually IS real health care for all so that everybody is covered and we get preventive care to bring costs down.

take the profit motive out of health care, can you say single payer insurance covering every citizen in the US?

Canada spends half per person per year than we do, with far better outcomes

Whether you like single pay or not, it's really the only thng practical anymore.

and the rich to forego their Social Security income would require SACRIFICE ON THEIR PART. And sacrificing for the common good is unheard of these days.

As far as I am concerned, I would consider myself LUCKY, if I didn't have to collect Social Security! But it's difficult to get people to think of it in those terms. It's like Disability insurance....I'm very glad that I don't collect on it!

The Greed in this country is disgusting.

in a couple of different ways.

1. The earned income tax credit gives poor families some or all of thwir FICA payments back each year.

2. The wealthier retirees already get 85 % of their FICA benefits taxed while most retirees don't.

3. The biggest means test though is the bendpoint formula that decides what your FICA benefit will be. It is incredibly progressive. A poor person who put very, very little into the system is benefitted tremendously by the payout formula in comparison to the person who maxes out his/her payments each year. One person could put 10 X more into the system over his lifetime and only get 2 X the benefit.

Not saying you couldn't means test it more. Of course you can always do anything more, but it's already very means tested.

worthy are going to be prepared all right. The top 5% of this country are feathering their nest at everybody else's expense.

Corporate America is raking in the bucks, employing people in foreign countries, and skating on paying their taxes. Here in Nebraska alone it's estimated, in order to attract business, that we lose out on 70 to 90 million a year in tax revenue. We give everything away to big business. We had a crazy place here called AK-SAR-BEN. It was where the horse races were held every year. One of only two money making events this frigging place had (the other is the College World Series). First we did away with the horse races (which were here only two or three months a year). The we gave the whole place, the buildings, the race track, the stands, the land (right in the middle of the city) to First Data Resources with the agreement that they would create 2,000 jobs. They got the land as a campus. Well, not only did they not create the jobs, they cut jobs. The kept the land. And strangely enough, the western end is now a shopping center. Who got the damn money for the sale of the land. It sure as fuck wasn't the people of city of Omaha. Whatever.

Anyway, this is why the majority of us are looking toward a very bleak future. It isn't because we take care of our elderly and our sick. It isn't because we try to have safety nets for the poor and the mentally ill. IT'S BECAUSE WE ARE BEING ROBBED BLIND BY THE RICH AND BIG BUSINESS.

That's the damn truth about the economy folks. And when we're all too poor to by, to pay for our utilities, to go to their resorts and hotels, they'll maybe start to feel the pinch to. But only on their income. The money they already stole from us all will get them by.

Get the VISINE and the Improved COFFEE...peeps need to wake up and vote BLUE

We are very close to Martial Law and a Dictatorship.....Only an informed Population will stem the Fascist Tide....

drops, coffee, toothpicks, totem poles, sticks, pitchforks... whateva it takes.

Yikes

"Anyway, this is why the majority of us are looking toward a very bleak future. It isn't because we take care of our elderly and our sick. It isn't because we try to have safety nets for the poor and the mentally ill. IT'S BECAUSE WE ARE BEING ROBBED BLIND BY THE RICH AND BIG BUSINESS."

:applause:

they get us right where they want us-destitute peons who will serve their masters for pennies on the dollar. :grr:

Do they blame it all on Hillary?

Can we now agree that red state working class people are brainwashed?

that others, such as women and minorities, should share the same rights and freedoms that they have. The Equal Rights Amendment was the final straw, the first shot across the bow of the democratic party here was the Civil Rights movement. Those two issues sent what was a democratic state right into the open arms of the republican party.

Liberals are out to ruin the country, don't ya know?

As the bumper sticker says, EAT THE RICH!

What about the Interest on the National Debt?

Those both dwarf spending on "social programs."

LOL

one only needs to look at the pie chart and know where to cut...

spending. Put them together and they are half the budget or soon will be.

economy is doing just ducky! Now who are you going to believe?

GO HAWKS! good avatar

National Champions.
Won the superbowl 100% certain, no question.

regulation of enough of our resources that costs can be controlled and resources conserved.
The VA can show us how much money can be saved when you can negotiate with drug companies.
I am not asking for the incentive for R and D to be killed. Plenty of money in private hands to pay for
special services, designer drugs and inspire capitalist medicine. But the poor don't care about that.
Those without health-care need a socialized dependable system that they can access.

Stay The Course!

:kick:

Healthcare can't increase and charge these HUGE Increases

it can't continue

Torture is OK with Joe Red State, but when he can't afford his cable bill, watch out.

look at the mess he's created.