As a lover of comedy and satire, I occasionally come across things that would be hilariously funny if they weren’t so damn close to true. In a world where healthcare costs are becoming our nation’s largest economic crisis (enabling Goldman Sachs executives to breathe easy for a moment), the Baby Boomers, who are aging into Social Security and Medicare at a rate of nearly 10,000 people a day right now, have become a rich target for comedians.
A few years back I read a hysterical (and frighteningly realistic) book called Boomsday, by Christopher Buckley (same guy who wrote Thank You for Smoking). In the book, a young female blogger suggests that Baby Boomers be given government incentives to kill themselves by age 75 for the good of the economy and the younger generation. Of course, her proposal is adopted as a leading policy platform by a Senator and would-be Presidential candidate, who jumps on this message of “transitioning” to seek his place in the White House. It is an absolutely hilarious book and includes such discussions as how many narcissistic Baby Boomers would have to adopt the “transitioning” benefit (aka, off themselves) to make Social Security and Medicare solvent (estimate: 20%). Given the way benefits are actually “scored” by the Office of Management and Budget and the healthcare economics debate currently underway in real life, the discussion in the book is more than a little surreal.
Recently I saw one of the best comedy pieces on this topic yet–a high quality video produced by satirical network The Onion. It looks like a real Fox News or MSNBC segment about a proposed Social Security reform bill that will save $billions by encouraging older people to “live faster and die younger.” This video is pretty short and totally worth watching if you need a laugh, but not if you are feeling a little sensitive about having been born in the Baby Boom era.
Among the recommendations of the so-called “Grab Life by the Balls” bill described in the video are provisions to cut cigarette prices, outlaw helmets and reduce the CDC’s recommended daily amount of sleep from 8 hours to “when you’re dead.” Best provision of the bill: replace monthly social security checks with vouchers for grain alcohol, back alley tattoos and extreme sports. Go Grandma.
When you watch the video, be on the lookout for the text below the reporter, which says, “Will the cost of treating wounds of the badass exceed the savings?” These Onion guys kill me (so I guess I won’t have to kill myself!).
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QuFnOYcy4E&feature=player_embedded
Another way to lower health care costs is to decrease unwanted pregnancies through birth control initiatives. Thanks, Obama 🙂
But you are right. My grandmother died a slow and painful death of congestive heart failure, as is my great uncle. It’s unfortunate though that people like these two who have all the money in the world to afford their health care, rely on medicare to support them. I believe Medicare should be for the indigent and needy elderly, not just all the elderly — and especially the ones who can afford to prolong their deaths as long as possible. This is not the government’s responsibility.
Hi Molly, it is certainly a controversial topic. Many feel as you do and others feel that if you pay in you should get paid out. No doubt it would be prudent to at least raise the age of eligibility at this point considering the advances in life span since it was enacted. Thanks for reading. Lisa
I actually proposed a serious version of this idea recently. Felt pretty bad about it too, because it actually does encourage people to die faster. Here’s how.
The fact is, about 90% of healthcare expenditures during the average person’s life are spent during the last 12 to 18 months of their lives, very often a miserable time where the quality of life has shrunk to nothing, but the medical community is tasked to do everything they can to keep you going regardless. Unless you have a legally valid “Advance Directive”, a document which you fill out for yourself directing caregivers as to your wishes for end-of-life management in case you are incapacitated and cannot make your wishes known – leaving it to loved ones, or worse, to the hospital staff, to figure out what’s best for you while your plugged full of tubes with marginal brain activity and breathing via ventilator. A grant funded program to promote (i.e., educate) and actually facilitate (with legal counsel, etc.) the widespread use and public storage of Advanced Directives would, I think, have a pretty good chance of dramatically reducing end-of-life healthcare costs for at least some persons who would just as soon get on with dying with dignity, but who might otherwise not get their paperwork in order to make that happen according to their wishes. Given the enormous unpaid bills (read: taxpayer burden) which can result from a single long term ICU stay under just such a scenario, and the ROI looks pretty good. If anyone’s interested, give me a call.