Biden’s ‘Medicare At 60’ Gains Momentum In Coronavirus Era
The former vice president in April announced his proposal to allow Americans between the ages of 60 and 64 the option of buying into Medicare, the federal health insurance program for the elderly. The proposal would be less costly than earlier versions proposed by Democrats in the U.S. Senate to lower Medicare eligibility to as young as 55 or even 50 as some new analyses are beginning to show. And Medicare would be particularly attractive to Americans with employer-sponsored coverage who are looking to retire early or have recently lost their jobs as companies close their doors and lay off workers during the spread Covid-19. “As the economy works to recover on the heels of the Covid-19 pandemic, guaranteeing coverage for the country’s oldest workers at a somewhat modest cost may have wide appeal,” Dr. Zirui Song, of the department of health care policy at Harvard Medical School in Boston wrote in Friday’s JAMA (companion article) about the potential implications of lowering the age for Medicare eligibility. “Lowering the Medicare eligibility age to 60 years would achieve meaningful coverage gains while disrupting commercial insurance less than would a broader public option or Medicare-for-All program.” Biden’s Medicare proposal is part of his campaign’s pledge to build on the Affordable Care Act. Biden’s Republican opponent, Donald Trump, however, has been working to uproot the ACA as well as its subsidized individual coverage known as Obamacare and also opposes expanded Medicaid. And the Justice Department under Trump appointees have been working with Republican attorneys general to repeal the ACA. The latest analysis of Biden’s proposal indicates it would be cost effective and less disruptive to the commercial insurance market than a single payer version of “Medicare for All” that would uproot the private health insurance industry and essentially bring an end to the role of private insurers. “Evidence on the effect of entering Medicare from employer-sponsored coverage shows that, at age 65 years, Medicare enrollment leads to decreased health care spending by about 30% without changes in utilization; virtually all of this reduction is related to lower prices for services—that is, Medicare reimburses physicians and hospitals less than private insurance,” Song wrote in JAMA. “Therefore, the policy would increase public spending by replacing some of today’s private spending with federal dollars, although notably at lower prices.” Details of Biden’s proposal have yet to emerge other than the brief description that emerged less than two months ago. Biden said the idea was to allow Americans to have more choices than they do now and allow them to keep their employer coverage if they so desired. Biden’s proposal to introduce a public option and expand existing Medicare is in line with public sentiment heading into the heat of the summer and fall Presidential election campaign. The latest data from the Kaiser Family Foundation’s health tracking poll show nearly 70% of Americans favor a public option, which is a percentage that has largely held steady since January and “before coronavirus became a major concern in the U.S.” The Kaiser poll also showed more than half, or 51% of the American public “now holds favorable views toward” the ACA while 41% hold “unfavorable views.” The poll was conducted May 13-18, Kaiser said, from a sample of nearly 1,200 adults.
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Medicare Blog | Medicare News | Medicare Information
Biden’s ‘Medicare At 60’ Gains Momentum In Coronavirus Era
Posted by www.psmbrokerage.com Admin on Mon, Jun 01, 2020 @ 02:04 PM
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Tags: Medicare, Retirement Planning, COVID-19
Seniors Will Pay Less For 2020 Medicare Premiums, Study Finds
Posted by www.psmbrokerage.com Admin on Fri, May 29, 2020 @ 02:56 PM
Seniors Will Pay Less For 2020 Medicare Premiums, Study Finds
Seniors will need less money to cover their health-care costs this year than they did last year. But retired couples will need a combined total of $386,000 in healthcare savings to afford them over their lifetimes, according to a report by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI). The report, “A Bit of Good News During the Pandemic: Savings Medicare Beneficiaries Need for Health Expenses Decreases in 2020,” examines the savings needed to pay for premiums for Medicare Parts B and D and Medigap Plan G, as well as out-of-pocket spending for outpatient prescription drugs. Medicare generally covers only about two-thirds of the cost of health care services for beneficiaries age 65 and older. This year, Medicare Trustees reduced projected costs for Medicare Part D premiums and out-of-pocket expenses by 10% - the lowest EBRI said it has recorded since 2013, when needed savings declined between 6% and 11%. EBRI said in a press release that the primary reason for the decrease was related to an annual adjustment associated with prescription drug use. While every little bit helps, this year’s 10% decrease will not significantly reduce the amount of healthcare savings needed to cover most seniors’ annual medical expenses, EBRI said. A male and female couple will need $386,000 this year to afford their combined annual medical expenses in full, even with a 10% reduction in cost over last year. “Americans should consider that even with this decline, the amount needed to supplement Medicare is still significant, and that they will likely need more savings than cited in this report,” Paul Fronstin, Ph.D., director of the Health Research and Education Program at EBRI and co-author of the study, said in the news release. According to Fronstin, so will retirees who incur long-term care and other health expenses not covered by Medicare. So will individuals who retire before the age of 65. While Medicare Trustees make small changes to Medicare program costs, EBRI said that policymakers are poised to make sweeping financial changes to the program as a whole through solutions that will shift still more responsibility for healthcare costs to beneficiaries, many of whom already are struggling to afford them. A copy of the issue brief, “A Bit of Good News During the Pandemic: Savings Medicare Beneficiaries Need for Health Expenses Decreases in 2020,” can be found at www.ebri.org. Founded in 1978, the Employee Benefit Research Institute is a private, nonpartisan, nonprofit research institute based in Washington, D.C., that focuses on health, savings, retirement, and financial security issues.
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Tags: Medicare, Retirement Planning
Boomers Need Help Living In Retirement
Posted by www.psmbrokerage.com Admin on Wed, Apr 17, 2019 @ 01:15 PM
Boomers Need Help Living in Retirement
But an annual report by the Insured Retirement Institute shows a healthy 66-year-old couple who retired in 2018 would need 48% of their lifetime Social Security benefits to address total lifetime health care and long-term care expenses. With nearly one-half of Social Security lost to health care, supplemental income or savings would need to be substantial for health care to be 20%, or less, of total income.
Expectation of Health Care and LTC Costs
The number one reason Boomers calculating savings goals do not include health care and LTC costs is that they expect Medicare to cover them – an erroneous assumption on both counts, especially for LTC, for which Medicare provides no coverage. The second most common answer is simply that they are unsure of the costs involved and/or they don’t know how to calculate them – a powerful value-added service for insurance agents to provide.
Reasons For Not Owning Annuities
The chart above explores why annuity ownership is relatively low despite demonstrable income gaps. About as many boomers say they don’t have enough money to purchase an annuity as say they have no retirement savings, an unfortunate reality. However, it is more common for boomers to say they simply don’t know anything about annuities than to be biased against them, and this is an opportunity for the insured retirement industry and for financial advisors. Similarly, some of those who feel they don't think they'll live long enough for an annuity purchase to make sense may be overlooking the possibility that medical advances will result in them living longer than they expect, and that medically underwritten annuities may increase payments to the point where an annuity purchase becomes attractive.
Conclusion Baby boomers, particularly those who are younger and still working, face an urgent need to save more and create financial plans for retirement. Most will not have pensions, so it is imperative that they maximize Social Security, create guaranteed lifetime income from their savings, and employ insurance protection and financial management tools to mitigate the risk that health care and long-term care costs will erode their savings and income.
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Everything Your Senior Clients Need to Know About the Budget Deal
Posted by Carly Callahan on Thu, Nov 05, 2015 @ 02:52 PM
On Monday, November 2, 2015, President Obama signed into law a two-year budget deal that diverts a spike in Medicare Part B premiums, but conversely wipes out billions in potential future Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) program benefits for Baby Boomers. While the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 has certainly granted much needed relief to nearly 15 million Medicare beneficiaries by lessening premium and deductible Part B increases, its approval has triggered an undesirable response to upcoming SSDI program changes. Whether or not your clients will be negatively affected by the budget deal all comes down to one very important criterion: While the reforms within the budget deal are projected to save the SSDI program $168 billion over 75 years, seniors who rely upon implementing certain strategies to increase the amount they’ll get from SSDI will ultimately lose if they fail to rethink their retirement plans. So, what are those strategies to disappear in just six short months and how can your clients get through this? Saying “goodbye” to the “file and suspend” strategyOne strategy, commonly referred to as “file and suspend”, has meant an extra $10,000 to $60,000 in SSDI benefits for some married couples age 66 to 70. Under current law this strategy allows you to sign up for benefits at age 66, but not claim them. For four years those unclaimed benefits will grow at the rate of 8% per year through delayed retirement credits. In the meantime your spouse may immediately begin collecting half of your check starting at age 66. (Divorced persons may utilize the strategy if they were once married for 10 years and are currently single.) Restricting a restricted claim of spousal benefitsAuthor of A Social Security Owner’s Manual, Jim Blankenship, believes divorced people “will be the big losers” due to the dismissal of the “restricted application” strategy. Under current law this strategy allows you or your spouse to file just for spousal benefits at Full Retirement Age and then let his or her own retirement benefits continue to grow. The end to the lump sumSenior policy analyst Web Phillips of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare (NCPSSM) says the end of the lump sum SSDI benefits is another “good deal that goes away” in 2016. Under current law if you are diagnosed with a terminal illness at age 68 you may collect a lump sum SSDI check for the benefits you had suspended over the past two years. Under the new law this would not be the case – you could certainly begin getting retirement checks immediately, but you sure wouldn’t get a check for those back payments. What should senior couples do regarding the change?
David Leland, a managing director of Merrill Lynch in Beverly, Massachusetts advises seniors to refrain from panicking. In the future spouses will have a choice of the larger of either their own benefit or the spousal benefit when applying for SSDI benefits. Any benefit they choose they “are stuck with”, said Leland.
While your clients may have already seen headlines disclosing relief to their Medicare Part B premium and deductible (to rise by 15% opposed to the projected 52%), it is important to inform them of the above information regarding the vanishing of strategies to SSDI benefits to come. Checking up on and reaching out to your current clients to share news of this political and economic reform could be a wonderful platform for you to display your appreciation for their business. By doing so you’re essentially dropping by to say, “Hey, Mrs. Smith! I thought of you when you read this and how it could affect your and Mr. Smith’s financials.” A.K.A. “Hey, I really care about you!”
Want to keep up-to-date with more stories like these? Give Precision Senior Marketing's Facebook page a “Like”, follow us on Twitter and request to join our LinkedIn group, titled "Senior Insurance Agents", providing a central exchange for information among insurance agents. to stay informed! :)
Sources: www.californiahealthline.com, www.forbes.com |
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