Obama Proposes Slashing Medicare and Social Security Funding

You could offer Obama a free dinner, and he'd give you 100 dollars for it.

Might turn out to be a very shrewd move if it's just to call the republicans bluff. We shall have to wait and see how this all turns out.

It is right to look at reforming Social Security and Medicare.

Tackling SS only because Medicare is too much for me to type right now: do you know why the retirement age was originally set at 65? It's because the dude who designed SS guessed (correctly) that no one would ask too many questions about his retirement age selection if he picked a "round" number. (Divisible by 5. Whatever.) If he'd picked 62 or 63 everyone would have wanted to know how he came to that number.

The Social Security Game - it's by actuaries, so your view of the gameness of it may vary.

Now, whether Obama means to seriously look at SS and Medicare or whether he is just bluffing is a different question. I hope he really means it. But the AARP accepts members as young as 50. That's a lot of voters.

That was not my reading. I read it to mean that he is addressing the Republican nightmare of skyrocketing entitlement spending, as illustrated in Paul Ryan's Roadmap for the Future budget plan which my slow-ass internet connection will not load right now. "Give me money now and I promise not to spend so much later," or some such. The article only mentions cost, not funding.

I agree with you that cutting funding for either SS or Medicare would be stupid.

I saw this article describing some of the various tax increases and entitlement cuts that are currently being hammered out. For the most part, the medicare cuts appear to be targeted "means testing" which are designed to adjust out-of-pocket expenses to a higher cap for more affluent Americans, and having wealthier Americans pay full premiums for drug prescriptions and doctor's care. Social Security payments would be slightly adjusted by switching the current inflation index to one that accounts for changes in consumer choice where people are still able to realistically manage expenses by buying cheaper goods.

I don't know if this would be the extent of entitlement cuts being discussed (I'd be surprised if it were), but if it is, it may not be as quite as bad as it sounds. Considering that these actions would be complimentary to certain tax increases and the elimination of some subsidies, it may be a realistic approach to compromise. When it comes down to it, spending needs to be cut from somewhere, but revenues also need to be increased. No matter what, no one is going to be totally happy dealing with the debt and deficit spending, but if there's pain to go around, it should come from those who can most afford it rather than those who may already be suffering.

I don't think anyone wants to hear stories about grandma having to eat cat food, but knowing individual wages are taxed up to 35% while capital gains are only taxed 15%, there is more than enough money being "earned" in this country that no one should ever have to go without. If the Republicans are looking for further concessions, I just hope that regulations are not compromised in any deals that Democrats make with them. After all, it was the lack of oversight and regulations that helped get the country into an economic mess in the first place.

I'm not sure any level headed politician is proposing cutting the programs completely or significantly. However, what may have to change are things like the amount of benefits, how benefits can be used, at what at a person can receive benefits, etc.

SS and Medicare, like most other aspects of our government, are in serious need of REFORM. Cutting budgets for them outright is like taking away an addict's heroin without giving him any rehab.

I read somewhere that the retirement age was set at 65 because, at the time, the average life span of a male was 63, and a female was 67 - 65 split the difference, and ensured not that many people would require SS payments at any particular time. Times have changed, and people live a lot longer now, so it is becoming a major drain.

Social security and medicare should not be part of the federal budget. There are payroll deductions set up to pay for each. If the funds are not covering expenses then either the payouts must be revised or the contributions increased. By including them in the federal budget the government gets to hide that the funds collected for thiese important social safety nets have been used to fund other programs for decades.

We have a bingo! Remember that "lock-box" Al Gore mentioned back when he ran for President? Neither do I.

Unfortunately, our society has a perception of entitlement (meaning you have a right to something) as a pejorative, as if it were some narcissistic claim to something undeserved. Really, I wish they were strictly referred to as benefits, however even that word is confused with charity, therefore insurance is probably best used to describe exactly what these types of benefit are. We have to remember that these programs aren't just retirement benefits either, rather some recipients are those born with disabilities or have become disabled, or widowed spouses or children who've lost their parents. This is pretty much what it boils down to, and any Tea Party member who believes that the government cannot mandate the purchase of healthcare insurance has to believe that Social Security and Medicare are also illegal government programs (and some do).

Fencer66 has already mentioned how the government has dipped into the Social Security funds, but another big difference is that over the decades, life expectancy has continued to grow, coincidentally, much of the wealth in America is among those who are retired or about to retire (younger generation's wages have been struggling to keep pace with inflation and are have become saddled with more debt). That isn't to say that older people didn't earn their wealth through hard work and diligence, rather it is the younger generation who hasn't been given their due. They're having to work much harder to earn less while their withholding is making SSDI, SSI, Medicare, etc less solvent. To make matters worse, payroll taxes for SS were cut by 2% last year, so while there's a little extra cash in pocket to help pay for increased energy costs and other inflationary hikes, there's even less revenue being collected for the SS Trust. They're also the ones who're going to have to carry the massive debt the government their parents' generation has rung up (by the way, did I mention the younger generation already carries a fair amount of their own debt?)

In fact, government has left the younger generation behind, there is less funding for education, a growing majority of the unemployed are youngest people who otherwise would be eligible to enter the work force to start earning (and spending) and learning important job skills. With less opportunity for these youngest workers, there will be prolonged stagnation of the economy and a continued drop in wages for them once they finally become a part of it, additionally, they will be less skilled and educated their older peers, exasperating the issue for a good portion of an entire generation. I really hope that those among us who are in their mid 20's to mid 40's engage this younger group instead of looking at them as competition (really, they're already at a disadvantage), but ultimately it is in our interest to have them working alongside us and engaging in politics. Just as government seems to have skewed increasingly towards business interest, so too has it been a forum of control for the generations who hold those businesses. As income diversity continue to grow in America, so too does a sleeping giant, one day it will wake and when it does, it will be hungry. One day in America, we may all be Socialists.

The answer to all of which, obviously, is to take even more from the middle and lower class. Maybe then they'll learn the true value of work!

We need to cut the taxes of the rich too.

its the ONLY way to grow the economy.

It sure has created a ton of great jobs in the last ten years, right?




Right?











*crickets*

But business owners want to hire more people, they're just worried about the economy and are taking a wait and see approach.

Into the valley of Death rode the six hundred.

I feel sure we can adequately defend ourselves at that level of spending. I find this plan infuriating, though... I'll learn the details, and it will make perfect sense. I'll write letters in support, and all that, but it will go nowhere and I'll feel sad. I'm actually watching Warren Buffett on Bloomberg right now, and he's calling for higher taxes on his tax bracket, and higher capital gains rates, but no one in the government will listen to that kind of crazy talk.

What the hell, let's see if we can get this passed, or at least keep it in the news.

Looks like were going back to the 2 Trillion dollar Debt reduction plan.

Republicans prefer smaller debt reduction plan.

They're takin' muh TANK!!!

So... 2014 elections...
"Democrats don't want to do enough to reduce debt! Why do they hate America?"