[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 86 (Wednesday, June 15, 2011)]
[House]
[Pages H4196-H4197]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1110
                            SAVING MEDICARE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Connecticut (Mr. Courtney) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, yesterday afternoon, Bloomberg News 
released an analysis, district by district around America, of the 
highest concentration of 45- to 54-year-olds. The reason they did this 
analysis was to see and focus on where the impact of the Republican 
Medicare plan would land the hardest. In the top 10 districts which 
they identified, the headline of this article, which obviously is 
Bloomberg News, a nonpartisan news service, was: Medicare Cuts Would 
Hit Republican Lawmakers. Nine out of the top 10 districts in America 
with that highest 45 to 54 concentration are Republican districts. The 
10th is the Second Congressional District, which I

[[Page H4197]]

have the honor of representing in eastern Connecticut.
  Now, some may ask why was Bloomberg looking at the population of 45- 
to 54-year-olds? Well, the Ryan Medicare plan radically alters the 
Medicare program, starting in 2022, for people who today are 54 years 
old or younger. Starting with that age group, Medicare will no longer 
be a guaranteed benefit, but instead will be a voucher plan where 
Americans will be given an $8,000 payment and told, Good luck. Go out 
and buy insurance.
  The Congressional Budget Office has already analyzed what that means 
to someone aged 54 today in terms of out-of-pocket costs. In fact, it 
would double the out-of-pocket costs for those 54 and below, in year 
one, who enroll in the Medicare program. Over time, we have an analysis 
which shows what the true out-of-pocket costs would be for 55-year-olds 
with a normal American life expectancy. It would raise their out-of-
pocket costs--these are additional costs--by $182,000.
  So for anybody who is out there today who is in that age group, you'd 
better start saving up because you're going to need a lot more 
retirement assets just to keep level with what an American who turns 65 
today gets under the Medicare program.
  We have heard a lot from just, again, one of the speakers a few 
minutes before, who was just making comments about Medicare's going 
broke and that people 65 and up are going to be protected in terms of 
their Medicare. Wrong. The Ryan Republican plan would immediately 
cancel new benefits for seniors today, that they have started to enjoy, 
starting in January: annual checkups, cancer screenings, smoking 
cessation.
  I had a town hall back in Norwich, Connecticut, just a couple of days 
ago where I had a young primary care doctor who was talking about the 
fact that the new annual check-up has allowed her that extra time to 
spend with patients, and she has detected three cancers because of the 
fact that she now has the tools to do her job smartly and efficiently.
  The Ryan Republican plan would cancel that annual check-up coverage, 
which the Affordable Care Act kicked in in January, along with cancer 
screenings and along with smoking cessation--all smart, preventative, 
wellness-oriented care which will save the Medicare program money, 
again, for people 55 and younger. This chart shows how the out-of-
pocket costs grow exponentially.
  I see some young folks up in the audience there. If you're 15 years 
old, your out-of-pocket costs are going to be $711,000 higher than a 
65-year-old's today who is entering the Medicare program.
  What this Ryan plan really amounts to is just simply a cost shift to 
patients and families. It does nothing to make a more efficient health 
care system, and that is not a solution to the problem.
  We also heard that Medicare is going broke, that it is going to be 
bankrupt in 2024. If you read the trustees' report, you will see, in 
fact, that it is a totally misleading comment. What the trustees 
reported was that there are sufficient funds in the program to cover 90 
percent of the costs of Medicare and, starting in 2024, for at least 
another decade and a half. Now, that shortfall is a problem. We should 
not have a 10 percent shortfall starting in 2024, but that is a 
manageable problem. We can make smart, intelligent changes to the 
Medicare program just like we have done going back to 1965 when it was 
first enacted.
  Again, we have had, in fact, solvency reports and warnings from the 
trustees that were much more dire in the '70s, in the '80s, in the '90s 
than the report that we saw 3 weeks ago. There is no reason to scare 
people and panic people into butchering the Medicare's guaranteed 
benefit in the name of fiscal solvency for the Medicare program. We can 
make smart choices. We can make smart changes, but shifting the costs 
to people 55 and younger is not a solution to the Medicare program. It 
ends Medicare.
  Now, within families with some who are over 55 and some who are under 
55, this will create two-tiered coverage. I can report to you of the 
Courtney Family. I'm 58 years old, so purportedly, I would get the old-
fashioned benefit under the Ryan plan, but my wife, Audrey, who is a 
nurse practitioner--she is 51--will get the loser benefit. She is going 
to have to start dishing out close to $200,000 in additional costs for 
her retirement under this plan.
  So you've got two-tiered coverage even within families under the 
proposal that we have with the Ryan plan. We can do better as a great 
Nation to guarantee coverage--with a reasonable package that is smart 
and efficient to solve the Medicare program. We don't need the Ryan 
plan, which will shift costs to patients and families in an unfair 
fashion.

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