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Privatization of Medicare [1]

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Date: 2023-10-19  

‘Tis the Season to be bombarded with tempting offers for Medicare Advantage (MA) plans. I’ve read that many of you are happy with your MA plans, good for you, and I hope you stay happy. The rest of you should know that MA plans are a path to privatization of Medicare. MA Plan providers make offers that sound too good to be true. However, they limit provider choice, and may raise premiums in later years when it’ll be harder for subscribers to get back into traditional Medicare with a medigap policy.

Social Security Works that has been trying to protect Social Security and Medicare. They had a virtual event today to raise funds for a new ad (the ad starts at around 5:48 in this YouTube link). I encourage you to watch the whole presentation if you want an in-depth discussion about the Medicare versus MA, however, Social Security Works also has this handy facts sheet. From the Social Security Works email sent to today (Oct 19, 2023):

Every year, private for-profit health insurance corporations like UnitedHealthcare spend millions on advertisements featuring boomer icons like Jimmie Walker or Joe Namath to trick seniors into choosing private plans that make their money by delaying care and denying services.

The ads fighting privatization of Medicare will air during the open enrollment period and feature Jon Bauman who is a strong advocate for Medicare and Social Security. He was the bandleader (“Bowzer”) of the group Sha Na Na and makes the point that tv and sports stars are not experts in health insurance and that they are getting paid a lot of money to pitch those MA plans. In the discussion Bauman claims that one Medicare Advantage plan ad depicts seniors who worried they are “missing out” on benefits because they don’t have Medicare C. (That fact that Medicare Advantage Plans are called “Medicare C”, is itself deceptive, because they are in fact private plans.)

I was anxious to reach my 65th birthday, so I could finally enroll in Medicare. I don’t have any serious medical conditions, it was because private health insurance is so expensive here. It seems like MAs want to extract the healthy seniors from Medicare by enticing them with things like gym memberships.

I joined Social Security Works, because they do a lot of good things. Alas, AARP doesn’t really get in the fight to protect Medicare, except for asking people to write to Congress members. Republicans are open about wanting to dismantle Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. I don’t think our letters are working.

The only way to protect these programs is to elect more Democrats to serve in Congress. To that end, besides working for Democrats, I also support the Social Security Works PAC whose goal is to elect leaders who will work to expand Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, and lower prescription drug prices for all Americans and never use the term “entitlements” to refer to earned benefits.

I did see Thomas Huxley’s post here yesterday on DKos with AARP bulletin’s take on Medicare versus Medicare Advantage. AARP is aligned with insurance providers (at least as its advertisers) who also sell MA plans, so in my mind, they have a conflict of interest. In fairness, the AARP bulletin does cite James E. Mathews, executive director of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (established by Congress to analyze the program and provide advice) who said that he genuinely believes “that the future of Medicare lies in Medicare Advantage”. As a Democrat that worries me.

I’d argue President Biden has a better plan to shore up Medicare (linked here) than privatization.

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