You think that a system that consumes 15% of the budget and provides inadequate services (unless you purchase the supplemental plans ) for people 65 years and older and have paid into the system their whole working lives can take care of us from cradle to grave ? The numbers say something else .
Medicare spending, minus income from premiums and other offsetting receipts are projected to increase from $527 billion in 2015 to $866 billion in 2024, according to CBO .CBO projects total Medicare outlays to increase from $632 billion in 2015 to $1.1 trillion in 2024.
But it gets better than that ! The CBO’s short-term estimates do not take into account the spending effects of changes to Medicare’s physician payment system brought about by the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA) . Over the next decade,the Office of the Actuary (OACT )projects that total Medicare spending will increase from $649 billion in 2015 to $1.2 trillion in 2024.That's over 6 % of the annual GDP or a full third of the annual US government revenues.
And that's before you make it cradle to grave .
