medicare-advantage

this year, benefits exceeded both taxes and interest, meaning that Social Security had to dip into the principal of the Social Security Trust Fund for the first time.

.. The Social Security Trust Fund is not — and never has been — an asset that can be used to pay benefits. Instead, it is an accounting measure of how much money Social Security can draw from general revenues.

.. Social Security’s total unfunded liabilities now exceed $37 trillion, on a discounted-present-value basis over the infinite horizon.

And that’s the good news. Medicare is in even worse shape. This year’s trustees’ report estimates that the health-care program for seniors will hit technical insolvency by 2026

.. The program’s worsening financial condition is traced to “higher-than-anticipated spending in 2017, legislation that increases hospital spending,” and higher payments to private Medicare Advantage plans.

.. Congress also repealed the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), an Obamacare provision that would have limited provider reimbursements.

.. In actuality, Medicare has been running a cash-flow deficit for decades.

.. there can be no long-term reduction in the national debt without addressing these massive entitlement programs. Social Security now costs nearly $1 trillion per year, and Medicare more than $700 billion.

.. Those two programs alone account for some 40 percent of all federal spending.