General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Am I wrong that Obama's chained CPI proposal exempts the bottom 20% of seniors? [View all]Yo_Mama
(8,303 posts)Some seniors (quite a few, really) who are just making it right now aren't on Medicaid/SNAP. As these policies are implemented, a ton more seniors are going to be driven into eligibility and a lot of those who were eligible before but weren't signed up will sign up.
This imposes thousands of dollars ( averaging at least $3,500 a year, maybe more like $5,000 a year) in cost for each additional enrollee. But your savings are marginal on each SS recipient who doesn't sign up, so this is not a very good way to reduce the deficit.
There are other proposals in the budget - such as raising Part D premiums for the lowest-income beneficiaries - that will have more effect, but the big "savings" comes in the form of a regressive income tax increase on lower income earners and the IPAB limit, which is supposed to be cut from GDP + 1% to GDP + 0.5%. That is a huge change, and the only way to accomplish that would be to cut overall Medicare coverages pretty sharply.
There is also the attempt to raise Medigap rates because the administration doesn't want seniors to buy high coverage policies. But it really is true that cancer clinics are dumping Medicare patients, and often the ones they are dumping are the ones who don't have those Medigap policies. For many poorer seniors, those Medigap policies are the only way they can get medical care for some conditions.
If you take the proposals all together, they amount to a HUGE attack on retirees.