Social Security has minor problems compared to health care and projected increases in the health care spending even without Obama Care. Simply raising the retirement age, deleting the salary cap, adjusting the cola, and/or raising the payroll tax 1% split evenly between employer and employee are some available choices to combine and use for social security.
After Medicare was implemented, Insurance companies quit offering health insurance policies to people who qualified for Medicare. It is not great insurance by itself, but combined with a supplement from private insurance, it is good and relatively inexpensive overall to the people who pay the premiums.
There is no premium for Part A(hospitalization). Part B is around $100.00. Part D varies. A supplement using the most popular F choice costs around $198.00 per month.
Demographics and modern technology are combining to insure that health care spending is unsustainable, but if the most expensive last 5 years of everyone’s life were eliminated, then it's not so bleak.
The talking heads are all bemoaning these expensive last years; None are talking about paying a premium for Part A or raising the premium for part B. Guess they'd rather see old people die or suffer. Of course, they all have enough money that they will be able to pay for the health care they would need when they reach that age.
“Guess they’d rather see old people die or suffer.”
When nobody has the money to pay for their care, what do you suggest as the alternative?
This is a serious question to you - I am not advocating killing people, and I have an alternative, but I want to hear yours.