Medicare will only be able to pay 87% of expected costs by 2024 and 67% by 2050
Social Security, the trustees estimated that the program will only be able to pay roughly 75% of promised benefits starting in 2033. SS has already begun paying out more in benefits than it takes in from workers’ payroll taxes.
I’m still very far from retirement, but all this says to me is 1) big tax increases 2) reduced benefits or 3) both
I think Medicare may become a capped benefit at some point, something like 5% of the Medicare population actually eats up 30-40% of the entire pot of spending. If you capped those people at $X max per year, that number will be reduced greatly. [edit: private insurance works like this already] makes sense to me
SS I never had much hope for, but with a huge generation of Americans getting old and will be wanting their money, I doubt any politician will have the balls to kill it off.
All I see is further kicking the can until some huge kaboom happens, then we’re screwed.
Eventually wealthie people will probably get less assistance and inflation will take care of the rest. Unlikely that it will just go away. Pandoras box is already opened.
In theory, your parents’ past contributions are supposed to pay for their benefits. I guess that would be the case if the government didn’t keep robbing the general fund…
House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said, “Despite the repeated efforts of Republicans to privatize Social Security and end the Medicare guarantee, these vital initiatives remain strong. Today’s Trustees’ report affirms that Social Security and Medicare will continue to provide critical benefits to seniors and other Americans.”
AFL-CIO President Richard L. Trumka said in a statement that the report “confirms that Social Security remains a vibrant, strong, and durable program….The Social Security surplus is large and growing. Despite lower than expected wage and economic growth and unexpected increases in the cost of living, Social Security will be able to pay full scheduled benefits at least until 2033 absent congressional action.”
Check your assumptions, ‘socialist’ governments have proved themselves to be far better fiscal managers. Canada’s version of SS will not run out for atleast 75 years.
The US accounts for nearly 3/4 of Canada’s exports. If the US crashes and the dollar becomes worthless, Canada’s exports are going to crash dramatically too. And I don’t have the figures in front of me, but exports make up a very large part of Canadian GDP.
So yes, unfortunately, if the US rolls over, Canada is going to get crushed, whether they’ve been responsible or not. But they do have nice doughnuts to comfort them while they sit and collect on their chesterfields.
I think social welfare is drastically misunderstood. The answer is more, not less. If social security is running out of money the government should start social work programs to ensure middle class Americans always have the ability to generate steady income to adequately plan for retirement.
As for Medicare, the simple answer is for the government to provide universal coverage for all Americans. Blanket coverage will ensure a healthier America. Healthier Americans means lower long-term health care costs.
^On the other hand, much of these exports are natural resources that the US is dependent upon. Other than timber (housing mkt crash), I see many of the products (oil, water, etc) coming from Canada as having very inelastic demand curves. And we’ve already had a housing crash and evidently Canada is unscathed.
There’s a thread over in the investment’s section about Canadian real estate and it’s recent rise. I see it as a bubbleish rise in value over the last few years. It hasn’t happened yet, but the market will definitely see it’s own correction, but who knows what will happen once interest rates begin to rise again. I doubt we’ll see something as bad as what the US has seen though.
The US went through a severe recession from 2007-2009 and the Canadian dollar has gained 20% over the USD, yet the Canadian economy caught a mild cold. It took less than a year for employment to reach it’s pre recession level. It’s a resource based economy. As mentioned above, demand for our resources is inelastic.