On Entitlement Reform
Ahead of the votes in the House later today on the budget plan, it’s worth highlighting three maxims that encapsulate America’s entitlement crisis, as summarized in a Washington Post op-ed by House Budget Committee Chairman Ryan. Any responsible budget plan, whether the House Republican plan or a Democrat alternative, should address these three truisms:
If you are someone who agrees with the president that we cannot avoid this outcome without resorting to large tax increases, know this: No amount of taxes can keep pace with the amount of money government is projected to spend on health care in the coming years. Medicare and Medicaid are growing twice as fast as the economy — and taxes cannot rise that fast without a devastating impact on jobs and growth.
If you believe that spending on these programs can be controlled by restricting what doctors and hospitals are paid, know this: Medicare is on track to pay doctors less than Medicaid pays, and Medicaid already pays so little that many doctors refuse to see Medicaid patients. These arbitrary cuts not only fail to control costs, they also leave our most vulnerable citizens with fewer health-care choices and reduced access to care.
And if you believe that we must eliminate waste, fraud and abuse in these programs, know this: Eliminating inefficient spending is critical, but the only way to do so is to reward providers who deliver high-quality, low-cost health care, while punishing those who don’t. Time and again, the federal government has proved incapable of doing that.
Meanwhile, the President was giving an interview to ABC News in which he claimed that he could reduce the deficit “without having to fundamentally change Medicare” – even though the program is already running tens of billions of dollars of deficits annually, and will be insolvent entirely within nine short years. Some would argue that the latter fact makes the former proposal sound unrealistic.
Also yesterday, President Obama attended several fundraisers at which he tried to frame his re-election campaign as centered around compassion. Some would argue however that it is NOT compassionate to leave future generations with mountains of debt – and that failing to address the entitlement crisis with true reforms will ensure just that.