GOP vs Dem Medicare Proposals

Here is the essence of the difference between the President's Medicare solutions and those proposed by Romney-Ryan:

"The fundamental difference between the approach President Obama and the Democrats have taken and the approach Republicans have taken is this: The president, in Obamacare, worked to reduce health-care costs in the system overall, including in the Medicare system, by, for example, eliminating the huge overpayments going to private insurance in Medicare Advantage and by realigning the payment incentives to reward quality of care over quantity of care.

The Republican approach has been to shift rising health care costs onto the backs of seniors. Seniors would get a voucher that declines over time relative to rising health care costs. Seniors get stuck with the bill. And so the president’s approach did not cut any benefits to Medicare beneficiaries. In fact, it strengthened the benefit to individuals with high drug costs, strengthened the preventative benefit under Medicare. In the Ryan budget, they adopted those savings but did not recycle a penny of the savings into benefits."

Details at the link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/08/18/rep-chris-van-hollen-the-romney-ryan-medicare-plan-would-have-immediate-cost-increases-for-seniors/