This is in response to AARP Wisconsin President Al Majkrzak's recent letter to the editor to The Monroe Times, in which he extolls the virtues of the proposed health care bill presently being considered.
What Mr. Majkrzak fails to inform Wisconsinites is that the AARP got a financial windfall in return for its support of the health care bill. Over the past decade, the AARP has changed from an advocacy group to an insurance company through its subsidiary company. It is one of the main suppliers of Medigap insurance, a high-cost, privately purchased coverage that picks up where Medicare leaves off. But President Bush-43 passed the Medicare Advantage program, which offered a subsidized, lower-cost alternative to Medigap. Under Medicare Advantage, the elderly get all the extra coverage they need plus coordinated, well-managed care, usually by the same physician. So more than 10 million seniors went with Medicare Advantage, cutting into AARP Medigap revenues.
Now President Obama wants to solve AARP's problem. He wants to eliminate subsidies for Medicare Advantage. The elderly will have to pay more for coverage under Medigap, but the AARP, which supposedly represents the elderly, will make more money.
A plan to slash more than $500 billion from future Medicare spending (one of the biggest sources of funding for President Obama's proposed overhaul of the nation's health-care system) would sharply reduce benefits for some senior citizens and could jeopardize access to care for millions of others, according to a government evaluation released Saturday.
The report found that Medicare cuts contained in the health package approved by the House on Nov. 7 are likely to prove so costly to hospitals and nursing homes that they could stop taking Medicare altogether.
The report offers the clearest and most authoritative assessment to date of the effect Democratic health reform proposals would have on Medicare and Medicaid, the nation's largest public health programs. It analyzes the House bill, but the Senate also is expected to rely on hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicare cuts to finance the package that Majority Leader Harry M. Reid, D-Nev., hopes to take to the floor this week. Like the House, the Senate is expected to propose adding millions of people to Medicaid.
In its most recent analysis of the House bill, the CBO noted that Medicare spending per beneficiary would have to grow at roughly half the rate it has over the past two decades to meet the measure's savings targets, a dramatic reduction that many budget and health policy experts consider unrealistic.
What Mr. Majkrzak fails to inform Wisconsinites is that the AARP got a financial windfall in return for its support of the health care bill. Over the past decade, the AARP has changed from an advocacy group to an insurance company through its subsidiary company. It is one of the main suppliers of Medigap insurance, a high-cost, privately purchased coverage that picks up where Medicare leaves off. But President Bush-43 passed the Medicare Advantage program, which offered a subsidized, lower-cost alternative to Medigap. Under Medicare Advantage, the elderly get all the extra coverage they need plus coordinated, well-managed care, usually by the same physician. So more than 10 million seniors went with Medicare Advantage, cutting into AARP Medigap revenues.
Now President Obama wants to solve AARP's problem. He wants to eliminate subsidies for Medicare Advantage. The elderly will have to pay more for coverage under Medigap, but the AARP, which supposedly represents the elderly, will make more money.
A plan to slash more than $500 billion from future Medicare spending (one of the biggest sources of funding for President Obama's proposed overhaul of the nation's health-care system) would sharply reduce benefits for some senior citizens and could jeopardize access to care for millions of others, according to a government evaluation released Saturday.
The report found that Medicare cuts contained in the health package approved by the House on Nov. 7 are likely to prove so costly to hospitals and nursing homes that they could stop taking Medicare altogether.
The report offers the clearest and most authoritative assessment to date of the effect Democratic health reform proposals would have on Medicare and Medicaid, the nation's largest public health programs. It analyzes the House bill, but the Senate also is expected to rely on hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicare cuts to finance the package that Majority Leader Harry M. Reid, D-Nev., hopes to take to the floor this week. Like the House, the Senate is expected to propose adding millions of people to Medicaid.
In its most recent analysis of the House bill, the CBO noted that Medicare spending per beneficiary would have to grow at roughly half the rate it has over the past two decades to meet the measure's savings targets, a dramatic reduction that many budget and health policy experts consider unrealistic.
