Tim Donner, U.S. Senate candidate for the Republican nomination in Virginia, was in Hampton Roads yesterday making a number of appearances.
After spending an hour with Steve Batton on Freedom 1650AM, he met with me for a wide-ranging interview in which he reveals his plan on Medicare and talks also about congressional oversight, the balance of power (checks and balances), treaty ratification, global warming, the Kyoto protocol, NATO, the War Powers act, and much, much more.
You have heard him interviewed on the Score Radio Network and VA Right for his background. Listen to my interview with him to learn about some of the policies he will advocate as a Senator.
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Additionally, he has shared with us his actual Medicare proposal. Here is his guest column:
IT’S TIME TO THINK BIG
by Tim Donner
Candidate, US Senate, Virginia
You would hardly know it from the treatment of the issue by both political parties, but America does face an entitlement crisis of mammoth proportions.
Democrats fiddle while Rome burns. And many Republicans, given the opportunity to back an imperfect but courageous Medicare reform plan set forth by their leading grownup, Paul Ryan, have run for political cover.
Most Americans are hoping against hope that Medicare can be fixed without reversing course.
It can not.
The fact is that entitlement programs swallow up almost two thirds of the federal budget, and that percentage will increase rapidly as baby boomers reach the age of eligibility.
Recent Social Security and Medicare Trustee reports calculated that the unfunded liabilities of Social Security and Medicare alone are over $100 trillion. And almost $70 trillion of that is in Medicare.
Can there be any real debate about these programs being unsustainable?
Now, it is one thing for those people at or near the age of eligibility to feel threatened by Medicare reform. It is quite another to pretend that those people 20 or more years away from eligibility should not feel threatened when these programs are headed for certain insolvency as currently structured.
There is a growing crisis of confidence in entitlement programs among younger Americans. So here is the question that demands an answer: can we with a straight face keep forcing younger Americans to put their hard-earned money in to a program they are certain will be insolvent when the time comes for them to take their money (benefits) out?
Obviously, we can not.
The Ryan plan is ultimately insufficient in salvaging Medicare for several reasons. First, the gap between government subsidies and healthcare premiums will steadily widen as participants grow older. This leads to the second problem, the sense of insecurity generated by dependency on private insurance rather than government guarantees. This is based on the third problem, the unlikely prospect of a new, competitive market in private insurance for the elderly. And all of this adds up to the bottom line: the program is highly unlikely to draw enough popular support to be politically feasible.
A far more viable solution rests in an entirely different approach to the problem. And it requires us to do something we have so far failed to do – to think big.
We can create permanent, sensible and politically feasible solutions to the impending Medicare crisis that will sustain the concept of guaranteed healthcare in retirement.
We can achieve what should be the ultimate goal of bold, visionary reforms: allowing people to keep more of their own money, make more of their own decisions and take greater control of their own lives.
The only way to solve the problem of Medicare while sustaining the concept of retirement healthcare security is by evolving to a system of retirement health savings accounts, or RHSA’s.
If we give Americans the choice to re-direct their Medicare taxes to RHSA’s, they will start to build nest eggs that will grow into substantial amounts by retirement. These accounts, (which should be supplemented by high deductible, catastrophic insurance policies) will re-envigorate the doctor-patient relationship, while providing consumers with greater choice, better quality of care and lower costs as it builds a genuine free market in healthcare. This program would wean Americans off of their dependency on government while simultaneously solving the impending Medicare crisis and dramatically decreasing government obligations.
And here is the foundation upon which this solution rests: because it is based on allowing people to put money into their own accounts, as with IRA’s and 401K’s, it is likely to be not only politically feasible, but downright popular.
Another element that makes this program feasible is that it would evolve over a period of 20 to 25 years, guaranteeing uninterrupted benefits to those currently at or near the age of eligibility who have planned their retirement around the availability of Medicare, while restoring confidence, security and self-reliance among those more than 20 years away from retirement.
For those who are chronically unemployed, live with medical conditions that require consistently costly treatment, or are otherwise unable to participate fully in this system, a public-private solution could be forged, consisting of a significantly scaled-down version of government assistance combined with risk pools shared by insurance providers.
If we think big, communicate this plan effectively and act with boldness, we can ultimately view this very significant issue through the lens of opportunity rather than crisis. Let us not miss the opportunity by thinking small.
