Will Social Security and Medicare be casualties of COVID-19?

[cataway]

you young ins will just have to pay more ,me i've gotten use to my new life style

 

[74x12]

One new projected date for when Social Security pays out more than it takes in as revenue is next year, 2021. For Medicare it could be 2023. The plan overseers do agree the impact of COVID-19 will likely hasten the date when these systems will be insolvent and deplete their reserves l

Social Security Costs Expected to Exceed Total Income in 2021

If they can give trillions to banks then the public should hold their feet to the fire until they pay up the social security that is owed.

 

[metis]

From a healthcare provider and administrator perspective - there is too much waste - Medicare is essentially a check writing program - no checks or balances and there are procedure based doctors who cleverly game the system - think extra imaging tests or the sixth or seventh back surgery to name just a couple of things - other issues are more controversial - they could save IMO at least 20-25% by instituting an oversight program - yes that would cost - current CMS overhead is projected at 3% vs 8-10% for health plans but it would also save money partly by deterrence - when someone knows they are being watched they are less likely to cross the line

Medicare is much more efficient that private insurers as it operates with 3-5% overhead (depends on what counts as being "overhead") versus 20+ % overhead with private insurance.

 

[Shaul]

Since the fed can print money, and since tax rates can be hiked up, there's only a problem if we let it be a problem.

This virus may help us in at least one, if not more, respects, namely that maybe it will encourage us to get our priorities in order and streamline our system to better reflect them.

For starters, what's more important: people or money? Depending on how we answer that question, this should help determine which is the best general direction to go in, and then we can build the rest of the "house" around that paradigm.

I can’t tell if you are serious or not. Printing money could not solve the problem. Basic economics tells us that.

 

[Shaul]

If they can give trillions to banks then the public should hold their feet to the fire until they pay up the social security that is owed.

Perhaps you could explain what you mean when you write “trillions to banks”. It isn’t clear what your are talking about. On the other hand, the 2021 federal budget will be $4.8 trillion. Of that 60% will be spent on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. We already spend trillions on Social Security and Medicare every year.

 

[Shaul]

There's lot of suggestions about how to solve it. Take the contribution limit off social security. Raise the retirement age again as was done before. Both. This article has 4 more all of which are worth considering: 6 Ways to Fix Social Security



Fix the health care system. If our costs were the same as the next highest, Switzerland, we'd be paying 50% less. The problem is solvable but entrenched interest oxen need goring.

Of the things you mentioned raising the contribution limit (by which I assume you mean the cap on annual contributions) would not work. The current design of the system is that contributions are coupled with future benefits. In other words raising the cap would mean more spending in the long term then the increased revenue. Furthermore it would give this benefit to high wage earners to the detriment of lower wage earners. De-coupling contributions from benefits would require a complete redesign of the fundamentals of the system and could only be done by an act of Congress. For that and other reasons I will forego elaborating on, it would destroy Social Security.

 

[Salvador]

One new projected date for when Social Security pays out more than it takes in as revenue is next year, 2021. For Medicare it could be 2023. The plan overseers do agree the impact of COVID-19 will likely hasten the date when these systems will be insolvent and deplete their reserves l

Social Security Costs Expected to Exceed Total Income in 2021

Before Covid-19, I suspected the social security trust fund to be depleted by the year 2035, meaning the money then being paid out of this fund in benefits would have to be equal to the money being paid into this fund resulting in a 20 percent cut in social security benefits being paid out. Now of course, the timescale for this trust fund being depleted will be even much sooner. I don't want any politician committing political suicide by trying to save the social security trust fund. I'd like the politicians to simply just let this fund eventually run dry out of money. I'm fortunate enough to have accumulated wealth and a somewhat lavish retirement nest egg without having to pay much into social security; hence, I'm not going to be dependent upon getting much of anything out of social security.

 

[metis]

I can’t tell if you are serious or not. Printing money could not solve the problem. Basic economics tells us that.

We are actually doing that right now as the money that's being sent out to millions of Americans is not part of loans from our own sources or from foreign sources. This is what "deficit spending" is, and it's been used many times before in our history.

 

[pearl]

Any suggestions on how to solve the problem?

For years Congress has toyed with the idea of privatizing SS.

 

[Shaul]

We are actually doing that right now as the money that's being sent out to millions of Americans is not part of loans from our own sources or from foreign sources. This is what "deficit spending" is, and it's been used many times before in our history.

There is a key difference. Printing money to finance singular events is one thing. Doing it for on going recurring expenses is quite another. The first can be done the second fiscally can’t. Stimulus checks are the former, Social Security is an example of the latter.

 

[Shaul]

For years Congress has toyed with the idea of privatizing SS.

An idea vehemently opposed by many in the masses.

 

[metis]

There is a key difference. Printing money to finance singular events is one thing. Doing it for on going recurring expenses is quite another. The first can be done the second fiscally can’t. Stimulus checks are the former, Social Security is an example of the latter.

First of all, what we are going through and paying for is not a singular event. Secondly, I was not referring to something that should be done over an extended period of time as that could all too easily feed inflation. Thus, it would have limited use for the short haul, but then raising the age of retirement plus increasing payments into the Social Security and Medicare funds can and should be done, imo.

OTOH, Trump's tax cuts were not in any way conservative economics. Matter of fact, it was totally irresponsible, plus it exposed the fact that the congressional Pubs are certainly not fiscal conservatives by any stretch of the imagination.