Covering the release of the annual Medicare and Social Security trustees report for The Washington Post, Amy Goldstein wrote on August 6th:

Specifically, the new report says Medicare’s hospital trust fund will be able to pay all its bills until 2029, compared with last year’s forecast of 2017.
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The report predicts that the Social Security trust fund will have enough money until 2037, the same date as in last year’s forecast.

The Post’s economic reporters need to convey to readers that the Medicare and Social Security “trust funds” contain zero funds. This is not up for dispute. When those programs’ revenues … Continue Reading

The headline over Amy Goldstein’s August 5th article on the Medicare Trustees Report reads “Health-care law strengthens Medicare outlook, report finds” but the facts contradict this conclusion. The Washington Post reports:

The federal law intended to spur broad changes to the nation’s health-care system has strengthened Medicare’s financial condition, with the fund that pays for older Americans’ hospital care predicted to last a dozen years longer than expected a year ago, according to a new government forecast.

But here is what the Medicare Chief Actuary actually writes about Obamacare:

Further, while the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, as amended, makes

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The March 22nd USA Today article by Richard Wolf and Alison Young titled “Health Care: What You Could See” reports:

The law extracts about $500 billion over 10 years from the future growth rate of Medicare, bringing it down from 6.6% to about 6%, says John Rother of AARP. In doing so, it extends the life of the program for nine years, which relieves some pressure to cut benefits or increase premiums.

This is just false. You can’t take $500 billion from Medicare, use that to fund a brand new entitlement, and then also use that money to say you have … Continue Reading

On December 29th, Mary Carmichael reported for News week on What Health-Care Reform Will Mean for You. She writes:

Two changes will affect people with current private insurance in 2010. One is that they won’t have to worry about maxing out their lifetime medical benefits, because as of six months after enactment, insurance companies won’t be allowed to impose those maximums on anyone. … A second is that people who are frustrated with their plans will have someone to gripe to other than their congressmen: the Senate bill calls for the immediate creation of new state offices that will handle

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Covering the Medicare ‘buy in’ addition to Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) health care bill in December 14ths USA Today, Richard Wolf reports:

Still, Medicare has lower administrative costs than most private plans and pays less to doctors and hospitals.

This is technically true, but only if you look at Medicare v. private plan spending on a total spending basis. Heritage fellow Robert Book explains why this is a terrible metric:

Imagine, for a moment, that Fred and Jane each have a credit card from a different bank. Fred charges $5,000 a month, and Jane charges $1,000 a month. Suppose it

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Newsweek’s Sharon Begley has an article in the September 7th edition of Newsweek titled: “The Five Biggest Lies in the Health Care Debate.” Two of the “lies” Begley identifies are issues we have already dealt with (Obamacare Will Enable Government to Ration Health Care and Obamacare Will Pay For Illegal Immigrant Health Care).A third “lie” that  Begley claims opponents of Obamacare are spreading is that “health-care reform will be financed through $500 billion in Medicare cuts.” Begley’s evidence that this claim is false: “This refers to proposed decreases in Medicare increases.” Does Begley employ this same logic … Continue Reading

Jennifer Brown’s March 17 Denver Post article “Colo. Medicare Patients in the Cold” blurs the line between government run health care and health insurance. Brown writes:

The recent closure of two clinics that treated Medicare patients has magnified concern for some of Colorado’s neediest senior citizens, who have long struggled to find doctors willing to accept low-paying insurance.

The loss of the clinics in Colorado Springs and Boulder — both of which shut their doors within the past few weeks — punctuates what doctors call a major flaw in the health care system: Physicians who treat the underinsured have little incentive

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Ceci Connolly and Lori Montgomery have an article in the February 21 Washington Post today titled “Obama Plans Summit Next Week On Long-Term Budget Difficulties.” The article does a fine job describing the profligacy of the current Administration writing:

First as a senator and then as president, Obama has presided over the fastest, largest outlay of federal money since World War II. Over the past 12 months, the government has pumped more than $2 trillion into initiatives to ease the nation’s financial and economic crisis, driving the federal deficit to historic proportions.

However, the authors go on to understate the threat … Continue Reading