Posted on 12/25/2010 9:14:57 AM PST by Jacquerie
I received my Medicare card the other day, recognizing my 65th birthday and making me part of one of America's biggest problems. By this, I mean the burden that the massive baby boom generation will impose on its children and the nation's future.
There has been much brave talk recently, from Republicans and Democrats alike, about reducing budget deficits and controlling government spending. The trouble is that hardly anyone admits that accomplishing these goals must include making significant cuts in Social Security and Medicare benefits for baby boomers.
(Excerpt) Read more at tampabay.com ...
Do they have to accept the benefits?
It is already too late - the choice will be made for us.
You make it sound like you are the problem and government is the solution. where as it is just the opposite, GOVERNMENT is the problem, we just pay for the problem.
Us productive people pay much more into the government than what we take out of it.
People have been turning 65 forever, and now people of the boomer generation will be turning 65 over the next 18 years, do we suddenly need to start turning it into yet another bizarre attack on the mythical "boomers".
Why not just discuss aging and Social Security like we have for the last 75 years.
Defense should be cut 1/3 WITHOUT sacrificing readiness or troop numbers. There is plenty of waste and abuse that can be slashed, if we have the will to do so.
All federal welfare programs, and I include SS and medicare in them, should be means-tested.
ALL spending that is not SPECIFICALLY authorized by the constitution, or necessary to meet constitutional goals, should be reduced to zero....
Yes, extend retirement ages, trim benefits from here and there, use means testing. The real answers are much larger, however, but imho there are answers: Cut spending to bare bones, eliminate departments. Once cuts are made, depts. and agencies are closed, then unleash the powerful engine that our US economy was and can become again.
From what I understand, there is a window of time around your 65th birthday in which you must either accept or reject Parts B and D of Medicare (those parts have premiums attached) but if you do reject them the monthly premium will be higher when you do accept them.
Part A is free and I believe you MUST accept it.
Boomers have actually paid in all of our lives (many in the “Greatest Generation” did not, or had a very low cap). If this were a private pension fund, there’d be no problem paying benefits. The problem is that the government stole our money.
And now they’re whipping up anger at the Boomers because the goverment doesn’t want to give it back.
Just give me what I payed into S.S. in my life and we can call it even.
He!!, just pay me half of what I paid into S.S. and call it even. I'd retire tomorrow!
We pay off big business and banks enough, paying off S.S. would be a mere pittance of that.
Because the BOOMERS are part of the problem.
Do your homework.
Do the math.
Yes, people are living longer, that is a big part of the problem.
The OTHER big part of the problem is that more people will hit 65, every year, than at any other time in our history, for the next several years.
Bingo!
Well I look at it this way,the Illegal halfazzed federal government had no problem taking our money and squandering it on the great society and every other BS social program then giving it to the world ,so tough chit !Sell off some Government asset’s to pay us with and they got plenty.
Get a 1099 for Medicare benefits and a 1099 for SS benefits. If you don't make much, of course, you don't get taxed. I don't like this idea. However, if we must "means test" this is the easiest, least intrusive and least bureaucratic way to do it.
Your doctor can even find the federales hauling him to jail for charging you MORE than Medicare allows ~ that's under the fiction that IF you ever accepted one thing, which you might someday if you are eligible, he's commiting Medicare fraud to charge you something different than what they allow.
At the same time if your doctor gets too many Medicare patients he can be charged with Medicare fraud and imprisoned.
What you need to do is make it legal for people who are Medicare eligible to purchase medical services on their own ticket.
The DoD has been the favorite scapegoat of the Libs for decades! When was the last time you heard of cutting HHS, EPA Education or DoE by 1/3? DoD like all other government agencies has waste. Claiming that the DoD can be cut by 1/3 without affecting the DoD mission is fantasy.
“Us productive people pay much more into the government than what we take out of it.”
Amen to THAT! I have 10-15 years to go before I can tap into ANYTHING I’ve paid in. Will it be there? I’m not banking on it. I’m making alternate plans for the next 15 years.
I’ve worked and paid taxes since I was 15. I don’t want to hear any cr@p about how it’s MY fault! Our blood-sucking Government is the problem!
And, yes. We get what we vote for...and we are being paid back in SPADES because uneducated, vapid, special-interest, nano-second-attention-span types are are allowed to vote!
What?? And take away the entire reason for becoming a Congressmen or Senator?
Politicians spend citizens' tax dollars NOT for the betterment of We The People, but as end-around payola for themselves on behalf of Lobbyists and their client-businesses.
Obama plans to take care of the problem with his death panels.
What if we could cut the retirement benefits of retired Congressman and Senators first?
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