Why do Dems keep buying into this narrative that Medicare is the problem? It is bullshit and Dems..

[DuaneBidoux]

need to start educating that the real narrative is the underlying costs of Medicare is a reflection of the underlying costs and increase in costs to the overall health system.

If you don't solve the costs and costs increases of the underlying health industry then all you are doing is transferring people who can barely afford it. You are just shifting costs that are still existing and increasing back unto the elderly and vulnerable not solving the underlying problem. It's like blaming the costs of rising auto insurance premiums on the insurance companies who are passing the costs along to customers when everyone is out driving drunk, texting, speeding and getting into horrific car accidents as the problem for the increased premium costs.

Medicare has much lower administrative costs per $100 dollars given back in benefits compared to the private insurance industries.

My girlfriend just ordered a medicine that costs $610 in the US from a Canadian pharmacy where she paid $220. These are the kinds of solutions we must be looking at (Medicare ability to buy drugs in bulk) along with means testing for upper income people.

There is also the plain old fact that there will be many more elderly as the Boomers retire who need Medicare and that is inevitably going to require increase in funding even if all the other problems I just wrote about (and many I didn't) are solved.

Dems need to (I say MUST!) take control of this narrative and educate the public as to what is really happening. If we do not do this then Republicans will be achieving what they really want to achieve: getting rid of the New Deal and and Johnson reforms.

Dems need to getting a new narrative working on their side. How could this be done?: Obama needs to take the lead!

[Jackpine Radical]

1. As long as Medicare is for the elderly only,

it will continue to be expensive because we geezers are the most costly large group there is to insure. The solution is to expand MC to cover everyone. Suddenly we'd be spending 10% or so of GDP on health care rather than the 18% that we now spend.

[leftstreet]

6. +1 Single Payer National Healthcare NOW

[DuaneBidoux]

9. Yeah..hate to say it but good luck with that.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

7. It's part of America's tradition of privatize the profit and socialize the losses.

I've been paying, one way or another, in to private health insurance for 30 years. Hardly ever used it. What do I have to show for it? Nothing. Now that I am aging and am more likely to use it, do I get credit for being a healthy "good" customer? Not a chance. They would just as soon toss me over to Medicaid if I got really sick and unable to work. Or toss me to medicare when I REALLY need insurance.

I would rather pay in to and strengthen a program that will ALWAYS be there for me, young or old, when I need it.

[Jackpine Radical]

18. And then to scuttle out from under paying

their fair share of the losses.

This country needs single-payer so badly…

[SugarShack]

11. Let us all pay into Medicare!!!

[Jackpine Radical]

19. We already do, of course.

But we should be paying in as a replacement for private insurance.

[Harmony Blue]

2. Current deficit is driven by defense spending

in the future it will be portions of Medicare that will drive the deficit. Most people simply need to realize this point.

[phleshdef]

3. I don't know any Dems who aren't saying exactly what you just said.

At least in terms of the underlying problem being the cost of healthcare itself. Anytime I've heard a Democrat talk about how Medicare is going to become the biggest driver of the deficit, they say so under the premise that its because of the rising cost of healthcare.

[Harmony Blue]

4. It is complicated but yes the rising cost of healthcare is part of it

AC act starts to address this somewhat but more work needs to be done.

[DuaneBidoux]

5. Many may being saying it but we don't have control of the narrative and that's what is needed.

So we are saying it but the message is not getting through.

So let me rearrange the question: how can we get control of the narrative and put into the public consciousness the narrative I laid out?

[No Compromise]

10. how can we get control of the narrative

yes-good question

They have the TV, but we have the internet and we won the election on the internet so the corporate media is becoming obsolete, but too slowly.

What can we do, right here at DU, to get control of the narrative.

Right now we are just watching the most moronic people in US history lead discussions on incredibly important issues,

meanwhile the vast majority while smarter than a US Congressman just sit idly by in horror at the slow motion train wreck.

Since we are smarter than them, I keep thinking, shouldn't we try to outsmart them, stop letting them get away with it.

It's like watching football, after you see they keep running the same play, you do something different to get around them.

Why can't we do that?

[nenagh]

12. Agree...great question re the narrative.

I watched Ali Velchi on CNN last night, react to the stonewalling House Republicans ...

He was outspoken in condemning them and, IIRC, he named those he thought were responsible.

He grilled a House Republican finally saying.."Yes but, you had XXX months to work on this and get it right"...

As it looked like the Cliff Deal was lost... Ali kept saying..."don't they know the Asia markets open in 4 or 5 hours."

It was unfortunate for the Repubs to have CNN's Business Manager react to the House Stalling moves..with such angst and incredulity.

So....we Dems don't often get a break like that on CNN....

I'm hoping Sen Elizabeth Warren can help lead the way through the economic fog of talking points...

and the DUers who understand can lead the way.

[Gregorian]

8. Here's a link to last nights discussion on this.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022114866#post24

[Igel]

13. The boomers are retiring.

That's going to be a huge increase in the number of people on Medicare.

Yes, costs per person are high. But even if you reduce the costs per person, the sheer number of people is increasing.

As that cohort ages, they will eventually die out. Until then, they'll require more and more services. Even if cost per service can be reduced, you still get a huge increase in the number of services provided.

Yes, costs are going to go up. But you have to distinguish between total costs, which are pretty much going to rise no matter what you do (unless you mandate costless drugs and minimum-wage health-care workers), and per person and per service costs.

[el_bryanto]

14. Means testing is problematic

If you make it a welfare program it gets easier psychologically and politically to kill.

Bryant

[markpkessinger]

16. Exactly! n/t

[Doctor_J]

15. Dems are very bad at messaging

either that or they want to cut Medicare as well. This was the problem with not including a Public Option with ACA. Once young people are included in Medicare, it will be perfectly fine.

[Sgent]

17. Did she pay cash?

Because in my experience, especially since the addition of Medicare Part D, most drug stores now have cash markups similar to physicians (ie a starting point for negotiating with insurance companies, not actual price). Walgreens list price on one of my medicines was $185, and my insurance company allowed $12.50.

If she is paying cash, she needs to sign up for a drug discount card if nothing else -- the best one by far (because they are tied into the drug companies' free / reduced drug programs) is http://www.pparx.org/.

At a minimum, shop the drug pricing -- it can vary dramatically. One drug I needed before I had insurance was $185 at Walgreens, and $20 at a neighborhood "discount" pharmacy.