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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated
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To: greenspirit who wrote (2814)6/28/2003 8:20:25 PM
From: JohnM   of 793843
 
Thanks for the nice post, Michael.

Let me explain my position a bit differently. One of the great social changes of the twentieth century was the reduction of poverty among the elderly. Social security in the 30s and medicare in the 60s were terrific advances on that score. Prescription drug coverage would be yet another step both to reducing poverty among the elderly, improving the overall health of the society--elderly and their children driven into poverty by their inability to pay for health care--no longer have to fear such.

But means testing would make that not possible. It makes it politically vulnerable to the point that it disappears over time. The simple form of the answer is if it's a universal benefit, we all have stake in keeping it and it becomes a political no no to try to take it away. So the poor and the near poor and the middle class keep an essential benefit. If it becomes means tested, the political fate is that it is viewed as a welfare program and like any welfare program it has no viable political constituency to keep it alive. So it gets cut and cut and cut. Regulations increase and increase. Fairly soon it simply passes away.

Can we afford it? Of course. And it's rather ironical that you raise the issue of affordability in the present context. The Bush administration has just pushed through the US Congress a huge tax cut for the wealthy which could have gone a long way to help the poor, the middle class, to pay for this. So the claim of too little money is hollow.

As for the tax burden on joe mechanic and jane plumber, if you considered the prescription drug benefit a social good, then we could easily find ways to do so without raising the taxes on them very much. Take back the benefits to the wealthy in the last two tax breaks. That's a start.
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