President Obama’s budget proposal fails to rein in one of the largest sources of federal spending: the ballooning costs of Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.
The Wall Street Journal reports:
President Barack Obama's budget proposal Monday will offer several measures to trim the federal deficit in the next 10 years. But it would leave largely unchanged the biggest drivers of future government spending: the Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security programs that are expanding rapidly as the baby boom turns into a senior boom.
Calling for major changes in the popular programs would be politically treacherous in an election year because of fierce opposition from seniors, who vote in large numbers. But budget experts of both parties agree the programs' growth must be curbed at some point or they will swamp the budget.
In 2011, the U.S. government spent $1.56 trillion on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security benefits—more than $4 billion a day—accounting for 43% of all federal spending. In 2022, if no changes are made, the government will spend just under $3 trillion on these programs, or 54% of the expected federal budget, according to the Congressional Budget Office.