The Born Loser by Art and Chip Sansom for October 01, 2013

yep…petty party politics

Ah yes, the ol’ J.C. Dithers school of thought.

What you call entitlement programs are funded not out of the general fund, but through specific payroll taxes originally earmarked for this purpose only. After the rates for the Social Security portion were increased by President Reagan and the age at which one could collect full payment, Congress began borrowing from that fund for other projects (mostly funds to special projects to repay contributors.) Despite this, even with Congressional IOUs in the trust fund, right now the Congressional Budget office and other nonpartisan sources report that Social Security has a surplus and is not part of the general fund deficit. As far as Medicare goes, Obamacare will destroy it, so you need not worry about that. The Actuary for Health and Human Services (dept. that runs Medicare and Medicaid) reported that the expansion of Medicaid programmed in Obamacare, as well as the subsidies for insurance for workers not low income enough for Medicaid, will all be paid by diverting the FICA taxes originally paid into the Medicare Trust fund. And to make sure that the US doesn’t try to pay two bills from one pot of money, Obamacare puts strict caps on the payments to doctors and hospitals accepting Medicare insurance. The Actuary says those caps have nothing to do with the actual cost of service and are based only on meeting goals to reduce payment of Medicare costs. Just in case that doesn’t cut down on Medicare enough, the committee that Sarah Palin called the ‘death panel’ will actually be created in about 2014 or so, and that panel of non medical persons will have the power to decide what types of treatments will even be eligible for Medicare payment. So you see you have nothing to worry about, middle income tax payer WUZ, at least, unless you plan on living to age 65. All over 65 will die from lack of ability to afford out of pocket medical expenses that will be routinely covered for people of value (those who are under age 65) Since so many will die, much less will be paid out in Social Security. So you shoudl be very pleased by the work of the President and Congress. At least, as long as you are a person of value, meaning you are under age 65.