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Like most existing government programs, it's a wealth transfer from the young to the old. The program pays for the old and sick on the back of the comparatively

• wwweston 13y ago
  > Like most existing government programs, it's a wealth transfer from the young to the old. It seems accurate to say that Medicare is as you describe -- we've more or less been socializing the costs of insuring the elderly, privatizing the risks/benefits of insuring the employable, and letting everybody else fend for themselves for a few decades. But it seems pretty tenuous specifically in the context of the recent PP/ACA legislation. The only arguable point is that by requiring people to join a risk pool, we're forcing them to subsidize the elderly... which we were already doing via a tax-supported medicare program. > The program pays for the old and sick on the back of the comparatively more healthy and less wealthy younger workers. Sure, in the same sense that any insurance program is. That is, there is no insurance program of any kind that isn't a "wealth transfer" to those who suffer from the insured-against event from those who don't. Though when talking about "young" and "old" in the context of a stable policy, this may not be a particularly important point. Most people are going to get a chance to be part of both.