How Does Obamacare Hurt Medicare?

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   Jim Winkler

   CEO/Owner, Winkler Financial Group, Houston, Texas

   That is a great question! There is an awful lot of misinformation, political manipulation , and muddying of the facts, so it's really hard to see exactly what is going on. There are some good and bad things that the ACA does with its association with Medicare, and I'll let you decide which is which.  First off is you do not have any changes to your current plan, nor is it even legal for someone to tell you that you have to drop your current plan and try to enroll you in the marketplace. All current plans are grandfathered. One thing the ACA does is close the "donut hole" in coverage in Medicare part D. It will eventually phase out the patient cost until it becomes just the usual co-pay, increasing the likelihood that seniors will be able to afford their medications. It also expands coverage by making checkups and wellness visits (preventative care) not subject to deductible or co-pays. It does have cuts of $716 billion to the Medicare, mostly in the Medicare Advantage plans that are run by private insurers. We are told that those cuts are to come from reduction in fraud, provider overpayments, and administration overhead. We are also told that the money from those cuts are being reinvested into the Medicare system, and that those reinvestments are expected to keep Medicare's trust fund solvent until 2029, an extra 12 years. It will also make cuts to hospitals that have higher return rates of patients by cutting the Medicare payments to those hospitals that are providing the least quality care. ( Interestingly enough, that was a lead story on our news channel tonight, measuring the number of patients who returned to their hospital after treatment for infections that they got while in the hospital before their release.) Those are the bare bones of what the effects are supposed to be. How it will actually play out is anyone's guess. Thanks for asking!

   Answered on May 10, 2014

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