Ed Morrissey

A 0.16% cut may not sound like much, but in an environment where general inflation is running 3-4% and health costs are rising faster than that, it's a real cut. This isn't even where cuts need to be made for solvency and to plug the soaring deficit spending, either. Medicare and Social Security operate off of the same assumptions on retirement and longevity as it did nearly a century ago, and they've only become more generous over that time. At some point, the thresholds have to be raised to recognize longer life spans and to incentivize people to carry their own insurance longer.