House GOP plan would cut Medicare, Social Security to balance budget
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
House Republicans released a proposal Tuesday that would balance the budget in nine years — but only by making large cuts to entitlement programs, including Medicare and Social Security, that President Trump vowed not to touch.
The House Budget Committee is aiming to pass the blueprint this week, but that may be as far as it goes this midterm election year. It is not clear that GOP leaders will put the document on the House floor for a vote, and even if it were to pass the House, the budget would have little impact on actual spending levels.
Nonetheless the budget serves as an expression of Republicans’ priorities at a time of rapidly rising deficits and debt. Although the nation’s growing indebtedness has been exacerbated by the GOP’s own policy decisions — including the new tax law, which most analyses say will add at least $1 trillion to the debt — Republicans on the Budget Committee said they felt a responsibility to put the nation on a sounder fiscal trajectory.
“The time is now for our Congress to step up and confront the biggest challenge to our society,” said House Budget Chairman Steve Womack (R-Ark.). “There is not a bigger enemy on the domestic side than the debt and deficits.”
The Republican budget confronts this enemy by taking a whack at entitlement spending. Lawmakers of both parties agree that spending that is not subject to Congress’s annual appropriations process is becoming unsustainable. But Trump has largely taken it off the table by refusing to touch Medicare or Social Security, and Democrats have little interest in addressing it except as part of a larger deal including tax increases — the sort of “Grand Bargain” that eluded President Barack Obama.
The House Republican budget, entitled “A Brighter American Future,” would remake Medicare by giving seniors the option of enrolling in private plans that compete with traditional Medicare, a system of competition designed to keep costs down but dismissed by critics as an effort to privatize the program. Along with other changes, the budget proposes to squeeze $537 billion out of Medicare over the next decade.
The budget would transform Medicaid, the federal-state health-care program for the poor, by limiting per capita payments or allowing states to turn it into a block-grant program — the same approach House Republicans took in their legislation that passed last year to repeal the Affordable Care Act (the repeal effort died in the Senate, but the GOP budget assumes the repeal takes place). It also proposes adding work requirements for certain adults enrolled in Medicaid. Changes to Medicaid and other health programs would account for $1.5 trillion in savings.
Social Security comes in for more modest cuts of $4 billion over the decade, which the budget projects could be reached by eliminating concurrent receipt of unemployment benefits and Social Security disability insurance.
The budget also proposes a number of other cost-saving measures, some of which could prove unpopular if implemented, such as adding more work requirements for food-stamp and welfare recipients and requiring federal employees — including members of Congress — to contribute more to their retirement plans. It assumes repeal of the Dodd-Frank Act that regulated banks after the financial crisis 10 years ago, something Congress recently rejected in passing a banking bill into law that softened some of the key provisions of Dodd-Frank but left its overall structures intact. And the budget proposes $230 billion in cuts from education and training programs, including consolidating student loan programs and reducing Pell Grant awards.
The budget also relies on rosy economic-growth projections and proposes using a budgetary mechanism to require other congressional committees to come up with a combined $302 billion in unspecified deficit reduction.
Overall, the partisan proposal was reminiscent of the budget released in 2011 by now-House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who was then the Budget Committee chairman and advanced a bold proposal attacking entitlements, slashing spending — and creating lines of attack for Democrats once Ryan became Mitt Romney’s vice presidential running mate on the GOP ticket the following year.
Democrats were quick to criticize the GOP proposal, while contending that Republicans were opening themselves up to election-year attacks by releasing it at all.
“The 2019 Republican budget scraps any sense of responsibility to the American people and any obligation to being honest,” said Rep. John Yarmuth (Ky.), the top Democrat on the Budget Committee. “Its repeal of the Affordable Care Act and extreme cuts to health care, retirement security, anti-poverty programs, education, infrastructure, and other critical investments are real and will inflict serious harm on American families.”
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I guess there are enough GOP members in the House of Representatives are are already convinced that they will lose their seat in November and control of the House in January, so there is little added political risk in cutting funding for this program that even Trump supporters approve of.
Maybe. I was thinking that could be the reason Ryan would put the bill up for a vote but do you think it would pass in the Senate?
The TEAparty doesn't have the same control in the Senate that they do in the House of Representatives.
There is also the possibility that Trump and the GOP might use this legislation as a bargaining chip to get bi-partisan support for his draconian immigration policies.
This would be a bad time to bring it up. If they bring it up before mid terms, a lotta people will get POed and help vote them out. If they wait until after the mid terms, they're might not have enough people to ram this through.
I imagine we'll hear more about this after the elections, where it'll go down in flames unless the GOP can hold somebody or something hostage, their favorite form of negotiation.
Sort of sounds like the mob, don't it? well that's the new 'merica under Putin and trump.
They would need a supermajority in the Senate to have the same control as they have in the house. Different rules they would need 60 seats in the Senate to have the same power and prevent a filibuster from the Dems. That’s why the personal tax cuts are temporary they don’t have the 60 votes in the Senate. They are limited to the kinds of things they can get passed with a simple majority in the Senate.
I was also thinking the GOP may be factoring in the possibility that Mr. Trump may get impeached so now is the time to get as much of their agenda through while they have him in the WH.
I guess they are this crazy. You're right, going to do as much damage as they can before it falls apart on them.
That's exactly what it is and something Donald Rump has much experience with. He thinks he's the Teflon Don.
We worked for that money. Those greedy fucking bastards didn't. Keep your greedy mitts off my Social Security.
Yes! Social Security and Medicare ARE NOT ENTITLEMENT PROGRAMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have worked since I was 16 years old and I have paid into both FICA and Medicare since that time.
No, they are not.
I don't need you to explain anything to me Mr It's Wednesday and I've Changed My Screen Name Again.
This is illegal. SS and Medicare are not entitlements. This is our money. Once again the GOP is trying to steal our retirement. Social Security is not funded by taxes. It's funded by the federal insurance contributions act. FICA is not a tax because its collection is directly tied to benefits that one is entitled to collect later in life. I've paid in 15% of my income for my entire life for this. It is illegal to use this money for general fund expenses. THIS IS OUR MONEY PEOPLE. DON'T LET THEM STEAL IT FROM US. You think we have a problem with homelessness now wait until millions of elderly and disabled people stop getting their checks.
Ryan's dream come true.
But by all means, we need to up military spending and of course 25 billion for a wall.
No surprise here, time to start paying for that tax cut.
Nothing unusual here, repubs always and forever for the rich and their tax cuts and fuck the poor and middle class by taking away what we have earned all our working lives.
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