When it comes to Medicare, which candidate's plan comes out on top?
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Robert Reich Guest blogger
Stumping in Florida today, Mitt Romney charged President Obama鈥檚 Affordable Care Act will 鈥渃ut more than $700 billion鈥� out of Medicare.
What Romney didn鈥檛 say was that his running-mate鈥檚 budget 鈥� approved by House Republicans and by Romney himself 鈥� would cut Medicare by the same amount.
The big difference, though, is the Affordable Care Act achieves these savings by reducing Medicare payments to drug companies, hospitals, and other providers rather than cutting payments to Medicare beneficiaries. A聽July 24, 2012 report聽from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office confirms this.
The Romney-Ryan plan, by contrast, achieves its savings by turning Medicare into a voucher whose value doesn鈥檛 keep up with expected increases in healthcare costs 鈥� thereby shifting the burden onto Medicare beneficiaries, who will have to pay an average of $6,500 a year more for their Medicare insurance, according an聽 analysis of the Republican plan by the聽Congressional Budget Office.
Moreover, the Affordable Care Act uses its Medicare savings to help children and lower-income Americans afford health care, and to help seniors pay for prescription drugs by filling the so-called 鈥渄onut hole鈥� in Medicare Part D coverage.
The Romney-Ryan plan uses the savings to finance even bigger tax cuts for the very wealthy.
Spread the word. Don鈥檛 allow the GOP to get away with this demagoguery.
