Washington, D.C. – Congressman David Schweikert (R-AZ) issued the following statement after the annual Medicare and Social Security trustees report was released Friday afternoon:
“I recall sitting in my entry level college statistics class almost 30 years ago, calculating the need to begin saving for the baby boomers immediately. Washington did not do its job then, now today’s Medicare trustees report tells us what we have known for a while—Medicare needs fundamental reform and soon.
“This report confirms that Medicare will become insolvent by 2024, a much more sobering number that previously thought. It goes on to say that even the IOUs will be exhausted by then and ‘without major changes in health care delivery systems, the prices paid by Medicare for health services are very likely to fall increasingly short of the costs of providing these services.’
“It is clear from reading this report that a key trigger to this sooner-than-expected insolvency date is due to the failed economic policies of the Obama Administration and its government take-over of healthcare.
“It cannot be more obvious that something needs to be done now and done quickly. We knew these numbers were going to be bad, but this report is sobering. However, House Republicans are continuing to push for entitlement reforms that will fundamentally improve these programs and create sustainability through common sense modernization.”