By offering beneficiaries an optional buy-in policy, it’s possible to pay for needed services and still limit the cost to taxpayers.
Medicare beneficiaries need dental care — vision and hearing care, too.
As the cost of President Joe Biden’s spending package shrinks from $3.5 trillion closer to $2 trillion, Senator Bernie Sanders’s proposal to add dental, vision and hearing coverage to Medicare has emerged as a sticking point in negotiations. Opposing Sanders are Democrats such as Congressman Jim Clyburn of South Carolina who would like to prioritize spending to benefit low-income people — including by providing health insurance for the poor in states that have refused to expand Medicaid.
There is a way to compromise — to add new benefits to Medicare without spending so much that there’s no room in the budget for helping the Medicaid-deprived.