[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 47 (Wednesday, March 24, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E536]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page E536]]


     MEDICARE REFORM CUT OFF AT THE KNEES BY CLINTON AND DEMOCRATS

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. DOUG BEREUTER

                              of nebraska

                    in the house of representatives

                       Wednesday, March 24, 1999

  Mr. BEREUTER. Mr. Speaker, this Member highly commends this March 20, 
1999, editorial from the Omaha World Herald regarding President 
Clinton's actions on Medicare Reform. Because of the imminent crisis 
that Medicare faces in the near future, I am very disappointed that the 
President has chosen to play politics with such an important issue 
instead of finding real solutions to preserving Medicare.

              [From the Omaha World-Herald, Mar. 20, 1999]

                          Cut Off at the Knees

       When President Clinton torpedoed the recommendation of a 
     majority of the members of his bipartisan commission on 
     Medicare reform, his action raised the question of whether he 
     ever intended the commission to succeed.
       Clinton has been demagoguing the Medicare issue ever since 
     before the 1996 election, when Republicans in Congress 
     proposed slowing the growth of Medicare spending from 10 
     percent a year to 7 percent. The President won re-election, 
     in part, by persuading some voters that the Republicans 
     wanted to destroy Medicare and forsake the elderly.
       After the election, the GOP insisted that Clinton must take 
     the lead if he wanted Republican help in repairing the 
     program, which is headed for bankruptcy as the cost of 
     providing doctor and hospital care for retirees outraces 
     available revenues. Clinton responded with the classic 
     bureaucratic evasion. He named a commission to study the 
     problem.
       The need for reform is indisputable. Medicare is funded by 
     payroll taxes and income taxes. The worker-to-beneficiary 
     ratio was 4-to-1 when the program was enacted in 1965. That 
     ratio will be cut in half by 2030, when aging baby boomers 
     will swell the ranks of Medicare recipients. By then nearly 
     80 million people will be eligible for Medicare. That's 
     double today's number.
       Meanwhile, medical care has become more sophisticated and 
     expensive. Medicare is projected to go bankrupt in 2008--and 
     that's before the impact of baby boomer retirements is felt.
       Spokesmen for the elderly have been pressuring government 
     to expand the benefits, adding coverage for prescription 
     drugs. What started out as providing doctor's services and 
     hospitalization would become a full-service health program, 
     not only covering catastrophic care but also paying for 
     routine services that people used to assume were their own 
     responsibility.
       The bipartisan commission recommended changes that have 
     been ordered by some congressional leaders, among them Sen. 
     Bob Kerrey, D-Neb. Changes include raising the eligibility 
     age in small steps to age 67 over the next quarter of a 
     century. The commission also said that people ought to be 
     able to receive Medicare coverage through private plans, 
     nearly 90 percent of which would be subsidized by Medicare 
     dollars. Such changes could save $500 billion by 2030, the 
     commission said.
       Clinton rejected the plan, although he said some parts of 
     it had promise. He characterized it as a reduction in 
     benefits, which he said is not permissible. Ten members of 
     the commission had supported the recommendation, with 11 
     votes needed. The 10 consisted of eight Republicans and two 
     Democrats, Kerrey and Sen. John Breaux of Louisiana, who co-
     chaired the commission.
       Instead of savings $500 billion, Clinton said, the 
     government needs to spend an additional $700 billion through 
     2020. ``Medicare cannot provide for the baby boom generation 
     without substantial new revenues,'' Clinton said.
       Taxpayers ought to cringe at the prospect. Clinton said the 
     new money will be provided by future budget surpluses. By 
     siphoning 15 percent of projected surpluses, Clinton said, 
     the government can fund his proposed expansion of Medicare.
       That is based on an implied assumption that the economy is 
     recession-proof, which has no basis in fact or history. When 
     the spending in a program is accelerating out of control, 
     government should at least question the assumptions that are 
     behind the growth. Clinton's solution is to find more money. 
     He is confident that it will be there. Yet neither he nor 
     anyone else, a year or two ago, saw the revenue tide coming. 
     And even if payroll and income taxes could generate enough 
     revenue to cover the rising cost of Medicare, that does not 
     mean it is right to let the program's budget spiral upward 
     indiscriminately.
       Health care for the elderly is a legitimate concern of 
     government. But it is not evil for politicians to decide that 
     government may have to be more efficient in subsidizing such 
     care. Neither is it evil to suggest that a major expansion in 
     benefits isn't affordable at the very time a big increase in 
     recipients is projected.
       At one point, with senators like Kerrey and Breaux taking 
     the political risks of looking for an actuarially defensible 
     solution, it seemed that a genuine, compassionate, affordable 
     and bipartisan plan of action could be arrived at. Now that 
     Clinton and their fellow Democrats on the commission have cut 
     Kerrey and Breaux off at the knees, that possibility, 
     regrettably, has become less likely.

     

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