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Trivia Tidbit Of The Day: Part 413 -- Budget Cuts!

Big Mean Bush Hates Health Care-

Go read some of the stories on President Bush's proposed FY 2008 budget:

"Budget cuts for health care" seems to be a big theme in the news stories. For example, from Bloomberg:

About one penny of every dollar Bush proposes to spend on the federal government in fiscal 2008 would go to Homeland Security. The president's total spending proposal is a record $2.9 trillion, a sum that includes cuts in health-care funding and increases in military spending.

Why is Bush spending so little to protect the homeland? Yeeaarrrrgh!

Why is Bush spending a record amount overall? YEEEEEAAAAARRRGH!

Why is Bush cutting health care funding? YYYYYEEAAARRRRRRRGGGGHHHHH!

I really hate the media. They do such a disservice to America.

Let's open up the actual budget (.pdf) and look specifically at the ubiquitous "health care cuts" claim, over the past decade (FY1999-FY2008).

Page 231...

"Medical Care" (in millions of dollars)
1999: 343,231
2000: 362,655
2001: 400,616
2002: 437,180
2003: 478,465
2004: 515,431
2005: 562,505
2006: 605,995
2007: 674,230
2008: 713,581 (107.9% higher than 1999; 63.2% higher than 2002)

Or page 57...

"Health" (in millions of dollars)
1999: 141,074
2000: 154,533
2001: 172,270
2002: 196,544
2003: 219,576
2004: 230,134
2005: 250,614
2006: 252,780
2007: 268,543
2008: 280,620 (98.9% higher than 1999; 42.8% higher than 2002)

Cuts?

Medicare, meanwhile, is a separate line entirely (in billions of dollars).

Page 152...

1999: 192.1
2000: 194.1
2001: 209.4
2002: 220.0
2003: 233.2
2004: 246.1
2005: 266.5
2006: 283.5
2007: 314.1
2008: 321.9 (67.6% higher than 1999; 46.3% higher than 2002)

Or, "Mandatory Programs" in Table 8.5 on page 141... (in millions of dollars)

1999-
Medicaid: 108,042
Total Health: 114,129
Medicare: 187,694

2000-
Medicaid: 117,921
Total Health: 124,521
Medicare: 194,115

2001-
Medicaid: 129,374
Total Health: 139,112
Medicare: 214,061

2002-
Medicaid: 147,512
Total Health: 157,142
Medicare: 227,699

2003-
Medicaid: 160,693
Total Health: 175,343
Medicare: 245,709

2004-
Medicaid: 176,231
Total Health: 192,402
Medicare: 264,890

2005-
Medicaid: 181,720
Total Health: 200,092
Medicare: 294,344

2006-
Medicaid: 180,625
Total Health: 201,382
Medicare: 324,879

2007-
Medicaid: 191,876
Total Health: 214,901
Medicare: 267,574

2008-
Medicaid: 201,944 (86.9% higher than 1999; 36.9% higher than 2002)
Total Health: 226,751 (98.7% higher than 1999; 44.3% higher than 2002)
Medicare: 386,493 (105.9% higher than 1999; 69.7% higher than 2002)

Cuts?

Okay, well, how about federal health care spending as a percentage of total federal spending.

Page 322...

1999: 21.5%
2000: 21.7%
2001: 23.0%
2002: 23.5%
2003: 24.2%
2004: 24.8%
2005: 24.8%
2006: 24.5%
2007: 25.5%
2008: 25.8%

Incidentally, those percentages were 2.1% in 1962, 7.1% in 1970, 11.1% in 1980, and 14.4% in 1990.

Or, how about government health care spending as a percentage of America's GDP.

Still page 322...

1999: 4.0%
2000: 4.0%
2001: 4.3%
2002: 4.6%
2003: 4.8%
2004: 4.9%
2005: 5.0%
2006: 5.0%
2007: 5.2%
2008: 5.1%

Gasp! One tenth of a percentage point of our economy less than in the 2007 budget! It's a cut! Yeeeaaaaarrrrrgh!

Only a Marxist could look at all of these numbers, see the numbers rising dramatically, but still call it a "cut." For a Marxist, though, spending a little smaller proportion of GDP on something from one year to the next is a cut. That's how they think. The government is the economy. The economy is the government. That's why there's so much talk in the media about lower taxes "costing" such and such amount.

That's socialist thinking. And it dominates our media today.

Incidentally, government health care spending as a percentage of GDP was 0.4% in 1962, 1.4% in 1970, 2.4% in 1980, and 3.1% in 1990. Even as our economy grows and booms, health care spending by the government now accounts for 1 out of every 20 dollars generated by the American economy. In the big picture, government health care spending is accelerating far more rapidly than the economy.

Also worth noting is that much of this health care spending is on auto-pilot. So President Bush or any future President can "cut" a little here or there from the discretionary portion of the budget, but the mandatory government health care spending trajectory is still decidedly upward.

Let's look at the changes in the Federal Budget from 1962 to 2008 (.pdf):

Of course, net interest is down from a high of 15.4% in 1996; mandatory spending is down from a high of 55% in 2002; defense discretionary spending is up from a low of 16.2% in 1999; and non-defense discretionary spending is down from a high of 24.9% in 1978, and up from a low of 16.1% in 1987.

Furthermore, looking at the budget numbers for health care cited above, out to 2012, it's a continual climb. As a percentage of total outlays, health care will climb to 28.4% in 2012 (from 25.8% in 2008). As a percentage of the economy, health care will climb to 5.3% in 2011, then fall to 5.2% in 2012 (from 5.1% in 2008). In dollar terms, "Medical Care" will climb to 905,272 million in 2012 (26.9% higher than the 713,581 million in 2008).

Also, does this...

2008-
Medicaid: 201,944
Total Health: 226,751
Medicare: 386,493

2012-
Medicaid: 270,223 (33.8% higher than 2008)
Total Health: 300,730 (32.6% higher than 2008)
Medicare: 481,620 (24.6% higher than 2008)

... look like a cut? Do any of these numbers look like cuts? Even with inflation?

No.

There are dozens of ways to look at the numbers, but every single reasonable way indicates that there are no health care cuts in the budget.

One would think it would be particularly difficult for folks in the establishment media to lie on the budget, since we're dealing with actual numbers. But lie they continue to do.

Previous Trivia Tidbit: Taxes On Big Oil Are Too High.

Posted by Will Franklin · 6 February 2007 04:03 PM

Comments

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