Medicare needs saving just as much as Social Security

[eridani]

Front of leaflet--

SAVE SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE!

As you are reading this, a commission charged with reducing the deficit is meeting in total secrecy. It is stacked with people who have spent many years attacking Social Security and Medicare. They will not reveal their recommendations until after the 2010 November election. The lame duck Congress will then be charged with voting on them with no further discussion allowed.


--Several national coalitions have been formed specifically to defend Social Security.

--Social Security is easy to defend. Despite a constant drumbeat of lies about its supposed “insolvency,” it is in perfectly good shape until 2037 and can be extended as is indefinitely into the future by simply raising the income cap subject to taxation.

--The organizations defending Social Security have mostly chosen to avoid discussing Medicare, because Medicare really does have some serious financial problems.

--Medicare’s financial problems are due to the anticipated large number of impending baby boomer retirements, a messy and complex system of reimbursement with irrational regional variations, and the multibillion dollar giveaway to the pharmaceutical industry that is Medicare Part D.

--Saving Social Security but losing Medicare will still have a disastrous impact on the lives of seniors. If Medicare is means tested, this amounts in practice to eliminating it and reclassifying it as Medicaid. Retirees will be put in the position of spending all of their savings and selling their homes in order to pay for their medical care.

DO YOU WANT TO SAVE MEDICARE TOO? SEE REVERSE.

Back of leaflet--

STEPS TOWARD SAVING MEDICARE

There is a single unavoidable fact about the financial problems of Medicare—its costs are out of hand because the costs of our entire health care system are out of control, and the recent reform bill will do little to control these costs.

Since reform is now a done deal and we were not able to get even a public option, let alone the single payer universal health care financing system which really could control costs, now what?

1. Amend health care reform to allow government negotiation of drug prices for Medicare Part D.

2. Amend health care reform with ERISA waivers to allow states (including Washington) to implement single payer systems now. Why wait until 2017?

3. Support Washington State’s single payer proposal, the Washington Health Security Trust.

4. Support efforts in states like California, Vermont and Pennsylvania that are closer to implementing single payer at the state level.

5. Join Health Care for All—WA.

PO Box 30506 || Tel.: [phone]
Seattle, WA 98113-0506 || Toll Free: 1 [phone]
info {at} healthcareforallwa.org || www.healthcareforallwa.org

[eridani]

1. I can send this to you in pdf or Word if you like

PM me if your are interested.

[eridani]

2. Kick for another day n/t