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The prospect of a Medicare Trust Fund bankrupt by 2001 and of staggering deficits in the decades thereafter, as the baby-boom generation retires, is bound to preoccupy everyone, young and old. The options will be a nightmare for politicians, who will be forced to present nasty choices to younger taxpayers (pay higher taxes or watch benefits for your parents and grandparents decline) and no less unpleasant ones to older people (pay still more out of pocket or accept a sharp reduction in benefits). It will be no less a bad dream for those providing health care to the elderly: the . . .
Daniel Callahan (Thu,) studied this question.