Entitlements

The Trustees of both Medicare and Social Security gave their annual reoprts today and the news is grim. Medicare, at its current rate of spending, will be wiped out by 2019, while it reaches its threshold (when payouts exceed revenue collected, by the end of this year). Social security will go bankrupt by 2041 with its projected threshold to be reached by 2017, a mere nine years from now. These are grim forecasts indeed, especially if one considers more and more baby boomers will be retiring over the next decade and will be entitled to the benefits from these programs. Yet what's more frustrating is the fact that if either Clinton or Obama wins the White House both of them will add yet another entitlement in the form of universal health care. How do we plan to pay for such a program when we cannot pay for medicare or social security? Such entitlements will seriously jeopardize the prosperity and fiscal health of the country. Such irresponsible policies will bankrupt the country unless market solutions, or enormous tax hikes, are set in place.