Legal Commentary

Details of Public Option for Lowered Medicare Age Tradeoff

By Jeralyn

Here's some details on the upcoming deal to lower the age of Medicare and drop the public option.

Under the potential trade-off with party moderates, near-retirees beginning at age 55 or 60 who lack affordable insurance would be permitted to purchase coverage under Medicare, which generally provides medical care beginning at 65. Medicaid, the federal-state health care program for the poor, would be open to all comers under 300 percent of poverty, or slightly over $66,000 for a family of four.

So, it's only for those over 55 without affordable insurance. What does that mean? How many people is that? Why can't all people over 55 get it?

Sen. Mark Udall and ten other freshman senators who have drafted an "amendment package" will be holding a press conference tomorrow. Udall will be one of those speaking on the Senate floor.

The Republican effort to reject the Medicare cuts in the bill failed today. [More...]

The bill calls for cuts totaling $460 billion over a decade from projected Medicare spending, much of which would be used to provide subsidies to help lower and middle-income Americans purchase health care.

These details are important, but now Republicans want to dither over abortion ban wording so this won't get as much attention tomorrow.

At what point do the compromises outweigh any remaining benefits in the bill? I want to know when all is said and done, how many Americans does the bill directly help and how many will be adversely affected?

Full post as published by TalkLeft on December 07, 2009 (boomark / email).