Enjoy It While It Lasts
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13 responses to “Enjoy It While It Lasts”
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two things:
1. Medicare Part A and Social Security are not funded from general revenues. The don’t “go broke” in the traditional sense of a bankrupt company when liabilities exceed assets but rather they pay out less than originally “scheduled” if no changes are made to payroll taxes.That’s NOT TRUE of Medicare Part B – which IS funded from General Revenues and WILL increase the deficit and debt as more and more money is spent to pay for an ever increasing pool of retired people. Medicare part B is a far BIGGER threat to the budget and deficit/debt than SS and Medicare Part A – which – by the way – work a lot like most pension plans and employer-provided retirement health insurance.. both of them are also predicated on younger employees paying into those funds to keep them solvent.
2. – Unless I misunderstand this: ” The quiet hints about expanding Medicaid in Virginia”
… ” The full Medicaid expansion that former Gov. Terry McAuliffe wove tightly into his proposed budget for the next two years — the document the House Appropriations and Senate Finance Committees have until next Sunday to revise — isn’t going to happen.
Instead, the money committees are looking at smaller groups of uninsured Virginians, say House Appropriations chairman Chris Jones, R-Suffolk, and Senate Finance co-chairmen Thomas K. “Tommy” Norment Jr., R-James City County, and Emmett Hanger, R-Mount Solon.
The idea is to bring them into the existing Medicaid program, which is jointly funded by the state and federal government.”
The GOP is NOT talking about doing the ObamaCare MedicAid expansion but rather the basic MedicAid. program… and looking for waivers .. and more than 50-50 funding…
go read the article…..
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Jim: Odd, right now I know just how you feel. Our fellowship goes back to Cassandra. We should form a club.
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250 billion dollars a year is the cost of the Federal govt not taxing money spent on health insurance.
A substantial portion of subsidies for Basic Medicare Part B go to support people with retirement incomes in excess of 85,000 a year.
Medicare Advantage – a subsidized program to pay for the costs about the 80% that regular medicare pays – is adding even more costs:
https://www.pgpf.org/sites/default/files/0087_medicare_financing-full.gif
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Dear Jim,
I hope you’re wrong, but as Willie Nelson might say — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8KP-z68DF4
Sincerely,
Andrew
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Come talk to me about Medicare spending when we stop spending money on illegal immigrants and tighten chain immigration. We are importing poverty.
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The difference is this: Obama’s stimulus occurred in the teeth of the worst economic meltdown since the Depression.
Whether you’re a fan of Keynes or not, you’d have to acknowledge that, at the very least, the Obama stimulus conforms with an accepted macroeconomic school of thought (spend/cut taxes in the midst of recessions/ raise taxes and cut spending during periods of economic growth).
No one can truly say that the current tax cuts and spending increases conform to any accepted macroeconomic school of thought (Keynes, Austrian, etc.). These policy decisions are pure madness.
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With the passage of the spending bill last week by a Republican-controlled government, I conclude that the government has no ability to limit itself. It is wired only to expand, never to cease nor shrink. The only offset to this can be economic growth. Rising interest rates will brake that. I see a big invoice coming…Boomergeddon, indeed.
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The role reversal — Democrats for fiscal responsibility, Republicans for economic stimulus — shows how far we have come. I keep on hearing from conservative friends, “the additional deficit is worth it just this once to achieve _____ [insert: corporate tax reduction, destruction of Obamacare pooling, The Wall, debt ceiling extension, . . . ].” For what?? Those are short term political achievements, easily undone. In fact they guarantee the need for follow-up — e.g., if not Obamacare/Medicaid, what? — but instead of tending to the huge legislative backlog and restraining our monstrous commander-in-chief, we see most of Congress preparing to declare victory and run home to campaign and raise money from now to November. Meanwhile, the price of this temporary reprieve, trillions of additional debt, will not go away. Speak, Cassandra.
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We need to consider making any money received from the government taxable just as Social Security benefits are; prohibiting any person who worked in a political position in the administration or for a member of Congress that is not a ministerial job from lobbying for five years after employment terminates; and strip the tax exempt status from any entity that spends any money lobbying. I don’t have details, only general concepts.
Washington is a filthy swamp. It needs to be drained.
As far as Obama’s stimulus is concerned, at least the broadband piece was a failure in Virginia. I was working with several colleges and school systems that had Educational Broadband radio licenses. Under FCC rules, those licenses can be leased to broadband providers for money and for free connections. I was able to attract good proposals for many of these entities, even after the 2008 downturn. But the availability of stimulus money caused the market to crash. Smaller private companies that had made agreements to lease the spectrum could not borrow money because lenders wanted to see which company would get stimulus money in which markets. As a further result, several of these companies went under or downsized radically such that they breached their agreements with the schools. And a number of people who I got to know lost their jobs and others a good portion of their investments.
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Social Security is only taxed if you have a lot of other income. It’s essentially means-tested. So are virtually all other deductions, tax credits and exemptions in the tax code.
Money spent on employer-provided health insurance is not taxed whereas money spent by individuals on health insurance is taxed.
Obamacare is not free.. it actually does cost money and how much it costs depends on your age and whether you use tobacco and your income. Many who get Obamacare – actually pay MORE for it than most seniors on MediCare pay – $134 a month.
But the simple truth is that the Pentagon , and all the other national security agencies that DO consume more than a trillion dollars of the budget (about twice what the Pentagon (Defense) spends).. they spend spend every penny and more of what would be budgeted to them.. There is not a weapon system they’d not buy… if they could and right now we spend more on Defense than the next 10 countries combined…that includes all our major allies and all our major opposing nations.
And the BIG cost of “Defense” is salaries and benefits….for armed forces personnel – 95% of them who never set foot outside the US much less on a battlefield somewhere… The ones that do – deserve every penny they get.. the ones they don’t – though still subject to be “called” cost dearly… everything from housing allowances, dependent health care, VA health care and VA education benefits.. etc… and not to mention the dozens and dozens of military bases the Pentagon WOULD close if it were not for Congress treating those bases as economic development for their states.
On the other side – we have more than 60 million seniors – many of who who have significant retirement income and assets – who pay $134 a month for health insurance and a few dollars more for Medicare Advantage which pays 100% of costs.
Keep in mind that people who get employer-provided – don’t pay taxes on the money used to buy it – and that costs the Feds (taxpayers) 250 billion a year…( that’s TWICE as much as Obamacare costs and it is not funded from the General Fund).
We could – and should – cut BOTH – “defense” AND health care – Medicare as well as cap the amount of health insurance that is tax free – like we already do with things like 401Ks…
The GOP could do this – they could cut BOTH and people would accept it… but cutting one and not the other is what puts them behind the eight ball – politically.
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re: ” prohibiting any person who worked in a political position in the administration or for a member of Congress that is not a ministerial job from lobbying for five years after employment terminates;”
GAWD TMT – you’d deny them their Free Speech rights!
Maybe we’re on the same track together after all, eh?
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