ARRA News Service
News Blog for social, fiscal & national security conservatives who believe in God, family & the USA. Upholding the rights granted by God & guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, traditional family values, "republican" principles / ideals, transparent & limited "smaller" government, free markets, lower taxes, due process of law, liberty & individual freedom. Content approval rests with the ARRA News Service Editor. Opinions are those of the authors. While varied positions are reported, beliefs & principles remain fixed. No revenue is generated for or by this "Blog" - no paid ads - no payments for articles. Fair Use Doctrine is posted & used.
Blogger/Editor/Founder: Bill Smith, Ph.D. [aka: OzarkGuru & 2010 AFP National Blogger of the Year]
Contact: editor@arranewsservice.com (Pub. Since July, 2006)
    Home Page
   

One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors. -- Plato (429-347 BC)

Thursday, October 01, 2015

The Looming Medicaid Time Bomb

Medicare Time Bomb
by Robert Romano: From 1985 through 2011, an average 11.7 percent of seniors were enrolled in Medicaid, primarily for long-term nursing home or home and community care, according to data compiled by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Keep that stat in mind, because if it remains true, as the Baby Boomers progress through old age, by 2030, as many as 8.7 million seniors could be enrolled in the program, up from 4.6 million today, an Americans for Limited Government analysis of the data reveals. By 2035, that figure could rise to about 9.3 million.

And it will drive the costs of the program to the moon, particularly the costs for long-term nursing home and home care targeted at elderly and the physically disabled, which stood at $88.85 billion in 2013. Why?

As the Urban Institute’s Melissa Favreault noted at the Department of Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation Long-Term Care Financing Colloquium on July 30, “We project that formal long-term services and supports use and costs will roughly track the growth in the aged population.”

That is not good news, particularly considering the older age population wave now underway.

By 2035, the number of seniors will have increased 66 percent to 79.2 million, the U.S. Census Bureau projects. 66 percent.

As jaw-dropping as that is, in the meantime the population of those aged 15-64 will have barely increased 6.65 percent to 232.9 million.
So, how will revenues ever keep up with costs if comparatively fewer Americans will be of working age as a percent of the overall population — for the rest of the century? We’re already running deficits and the answer is, they won’t.

Consider, since 1995, the number of older Americans enrolled in Medicaid has only increased on a net basis by 11.6 percent. And yet, the costs for Medicaid nursing home expenditures are up 75 percent.

If the above ratio holds, the annual tab for long-term care could be as high as half-trillion dollars. And that does not take into account non-seniors who will also be taking advantage of Medicaid.

The explosion of long-term care costs for seniors will be true whether or not Medicaid expansion under the health care law is ever repealed, since qualifying for Medicaid as a senior predates the law’s enactment in 2010.

Seniors constitute most of the costs for those long-term services, about 63 percent, CMS data from 2010 reveals. That includes about 71 percent of nursing home expenditures. As the number of Americans 65 years and older using the program doubles over the next 20 years, that figure should begin rising, along with seniors’ share of overall Medicaid spending.

This puts states in particular in a rather alarming situation. The hundreds of billions that will be spent through Medicaid on long-term care for seniors will be in addition to the hundreds of billions more spent on non-seniors.

Seniors only accounted for 6.7 percent of the 63.7 million Medicaid beneficiaries in 2010, and yet, made up almost a full quarter of benefits paid — $82.6 billion out of its $311 billion budget.

And now, with Medicaid expansion, by 2024 alone, the Congressional Budget Office estimates there could be as many as 93 million Americans enrolled in the program as a whole.

This will get out of control rapidly.

To a certain extent, the health care law attempts to anticipate some of these challenges and included several financing schemes to boost funding for long-term care for the states. Whether their provision was sufficient, and if it was, whether they are sustainable when the money will have to be borrowed remains very much in question.

Much of these schemes attempt to control the costs by replacing senior nursing home care to home care, probably on the presumption that there will not be enough beds and non-institutional care is hopefully cheaper. But even there, there are cost concerns.

A new rule by the Department of Labor enforcing the Fair Labor Standards Act lifted exemptions to the Act that had previously excluded home care workers from minimum wage and overtime pay guarantees. Under the new regime, once the rule takes effect, the costs of home care will necessarily increase — and precisely at the time when demand for those services is about to skyrocket.

Between the demographic time bomb about to go off — that is, the growth of the elderly population far exceeding the growth of the working age population by several orders of magnitude — and then the weak economy, the huge expansion of entitlements under the health care law, and the dramatic increases of the costs of those entitlements, including for labor, what could possibly go wrong?

You do the math. And afterward, if you can figure a way out of this mess, please send a note to Congress. Because they probably have no clue what to do. Repealing the health care law’s Medicaid expansion for non-seniors is just the tip of the iceberg.
----------------
Robert Romano is the Senior Editor of Americans for Limited Government. His article was first shared on the ALG's NetRight Daily blog.

Tags: Robert Romano, Americans For Limited Government, Looming, Medicare, time bomb, To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!
Posted by Bill Smith at 3:00 PM - Post Link

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home


View U.S. National Debt

Don't miss anything!
Subscribe to the
ARRA News Service
It's FREE & No Ads!

You will receive a verification email
& must validate you subscribed!

You Then Receive One Email Each AM
With Prior Days Articles / Toons / More


Also, Join & leave conservative posts & comments on
Facebook.com/ARRANewsService


Recent Posts:
Personal Tweets by the editor:
Dr. Bill - OzarkGuru - @arra
#Christian Conservative; Retired USAF & Grad Professor. Constitution NRA ProLife schoolchoice fairtax - Editor ARRA NEWS SERVICE. THANKS FOR FOLLOWING!

Action Links!
State Upper & Lower House Members
State Attorney Generals
State Governors
The White House
US House of Representatives
US Senators
GrassFire
NumbersUSA
Ballotpedia

Facebook Accts - Dr. Bill Smith
Pages:
ARRA News Service
Arkansans Against Big Government
Alley-White Am. Legion #52
Catholics & Protestants United Against Discrimination
End Taxpayer Funding of NPR
Overturn Roe V. Wade
Prolife Soldiers
Project Wildfire 4 Life
Republican Liberty Caucus of Arkansas
The Gold Standard
US Atty Gen Loretta Lynch, aka Eric Holder, Must Go
Veterans for Sarah Palin
Why Vote for Hillary (Satire)
FB Groups:
Arkansas For Sarah Palin
Arkansas Conservative Caucus
Arkansas County Tea Party
Arkansans' Discussion Group on National Issues
Blogs for Borders
Conservative Solutions
Conservative Voices
Defend Marriage -- Arkansas
FairTax
FairTax Nation
Arkansas for FairTax
Friends of the TEA Party in Arkansas
Freedom Roundtable
Pro-Life Rocks - Arkansas
Republican Network
Republican Liberty Caucus of AR
Reject the U.N.

Patriots
Exchange
Links

Request Via
Article Comment

Links to ARRA News
A Patriotic Nurse
Agora Associates
a12iggymom's Blog
America, You Asked For It!
America's Best Choice
ARRA News Twitter
As The Crackerhead Crumbles
Blogs For Borders
Blogs for Palin
Blow the Trumpet Ministry
Boot Berryism
Cap'n Bob & the Damsel
Chicago Ray Report - Obama Regime Report
Chuck Baldwin - links
Common Cents
Conservative Voices
Diana's Corner
Greater Fitchburg For Life
Lasting Liberty Blog
Liberal Isn't Amy
Marathon Pundit
Patriot's Corner
Right on Issues that Matter
Right Reason
Rocking on the Right Side
Saber Point
Saline Watchdog
Sultan Knish
The Blue Eye View
The Born Again Americans
TEA Party Cartoons
The Foxhole | Unapologetic Patriot
The Liberty Republican
The O Word
The Path to Tyranny Blog
The Real Polichick
The War on Guns
TOTUS
Twitter @ARRA
Underground Notes
Warning Signs
Women's Prayer & Action
WyBlog

Editor's Managed Twitter Accounts
Twitter Dr. Bill Smith @arra
Twitter Arkansas @GOPNetwork
Twitter @BootBerryism
Twitter @SovereignAllies
Twitter @FairTaxNation

Editor's Recommended Orgs
Accuracy in Media (AIM)
American Action Forum (AAF)
American Committment
American Culture & Faith Institute
American Enterprise Institute
American Family Business Institute
Americans for Limited Government
Americans for Prosperity
Americans for Tax Reform
American Security Council Fdn
AR Faith & Ethics Council
Arkansas Policy Foundation
Ayn Rand Institute
Bill of Rights Institute
Campaign for Working Families
CATO Institute
Center for Individual Freedom
Center for Immigration Studies
Center for Just Society
Center for Freedom & Prosperity
Citizens Against Gov't Waste
Citizens in Charge Foundstion
Coalition for the Future American Worker
Competitive Enterprise Institute
Concerned Veterans for America
Concerned Women for America
Declaration of Am. Renewal
Eagle Forum
FairTax
Family Research Council
Family Security Matters
Franklin Center for Gov't & Public Integrity
Freedom Works
Gingrich Productions
Global Incident Map
Great Americans
Gold Standard 2012 Project
Gun Owners of America (GOA)
Heritage Action for America
David Horowitz Freedom Center
Institute For Justice
Institute for Truth in Accounting
Intercollegiate Studies Institute
Judicial Watch
Less Government
Media Reseach Center
National Center for Policy Analysis
National Right To Work Foundation
National Rifle Association (NRA)
National Rifle Association (NRA-ILA)
News Busters
O'Bluejacket's Patriotic Flicks
OathKeepers
Open Secrets
Presidential Prayer Team
Religious Freedom Coalition
Renew America
Ron Paul Institute
State Policy Network
Tax Foundation
Tax Policy Center
The Club for Growth
The Federalist
The Gold Standard Now
The Heritage Foundation
The Leadership Institute
Truth in Accounting
Union Facts



Blogs For Borders

Reject the United Nations

Presidential Prayer Team

Thousands of Deadly Islamic Terror Attacks Since 9/11


FairTax Nation on FaceBook
Friends of Israel - Stand with Israel
Blog Feeds
Syndicated - Get the ARRA News Service feed Syndicated!
ARRA Blog Feed

Add to Google Reader or Homepage

Add to The Free Dictionary

Powered by Blogger


  • To Exchange Links - Email: editor@arranewsservice.com!
  • Comments by contributing authors or other sources do not necessarily reflect the position the editor, other contributing authors, sources, readers, or commenters. No contributors, or editors are paid for articles, images, cartoons, etc. While having reported on and promoting principles & beleifs beliefs of other organizations, this blog/site is soley controlled and supported by the editor. This site/blog does not advertise for money or services nor does it solicit funding for its support.
  • Fair Use: This site/blog may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available to advance understanding of political, human rights, economic, democracy, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material as provided for in section Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107 of the US Copyright Law. Per said section, the material on this site/blog is distributed without profit to readers to view for the expressed purpose of viewing the included information for research, educational, or satirical purposes. Any person/entity seeking to use copyrighted material shared on this site/blog for purposes that go beyond "fair use," must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
  • © 2006 - 2020 ARRA News Service
Creative Commons License
Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.