Fighting for Health & Retirement Security for Hispanics

 Protecting Medicare from GOP Plan to End It

• On April 15, 2011, House Republicans passed their budget to end Medicare and replace it with an inadequate voucher to buy private insurance, for those now under 55.  The GOP plan would:
  • Increase out-of-pocket health care costs for the typical senior by more than $6,000
  • Put seniors at the mercy of private insurance companies
  • No longer guarantee seniors the same level of benefits and choice of doctor that they have today under Medicare

• This GOP plan to end Medicare would have a very damaging impact on America’s Hispanic families:
  • 3.3 million Latinos rely upon Medicare for health care. 

Protecting Social Security from GOP Efforts to Privatize It

 Social Security is once again under assault by Congressional Republicans.  A number of key Republicans have proposed to privatize Social Security – turning it over to the whims of Wall Street and jeopardizing seniors’ economic security with a risky scheme that could cut benefits, just as President George W. Bush tried to do in 2005.

• • For example, in June, Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX), who is head of the National Republican Congressional Committee and part of the House GOP Leadership, introduced H.R. 2109, which is a Social Security privatization bill.  The Sessions privatization bill threatens benefits for current seniors by draining the Trust Fund of resources needed to pay the guaranteed benefits they have earned and puts future seniors at risk of having no Social Security protection at all.

• GOP efforts to privatize Social Security would have a particularly damaging impact on Hispanics:
  • Hispanics are more likely to rely on Social Security in their retirement, with less access to private plans.
  • Among Hispanic seniors, 36% of married couples and 62% of unmarried seniors relied on Social Security for 90% or more of their income in 2009. [SSA]
  • As many as 30 percent of Hispanics escape poverty each year because of the monthly Social Security check they receive. [AARP]
  • The portion of Hispanics (35%) with jobs that provide retirement benefits is significantly smaller than for non-Hispanic whites. 

Protecting Medicaid, Which Pays for Nursing Home Care for Seniors, From GOP Plans to Slash It

• The Republican budget changes Medicaid from an entitlement to a block grant to the states and at the same time slashes funding for Medicaid by $771 billion over the next 10 years.  According to CBO, the GOP plan would cut federal Medicaid spending by 35 percent by 2022 and by 49 percent by 2030.
• Long-term care constitutes about one-third of Medicaid spending and Medicaid is the primary payer for 64 percent of all nursing home residents.
• Because the GOP plan would require such deep cuts in federal Medicaid funding, the GOP plan would result in less coverage for nursing home residents and shift more of the cost of nursing home care to seniors and their families.
• The GOP plan to slash spending for nursing home care for seniors would have a particularly devastating impact on Hispanics.
  • 23 percent of seniors on Medicaid are Hispanic. [NCLR]
  • Between 1999 and 2008, the number of elderly Hispanics living in US nursing homes grew by 55 percent. [Health Affairs]

• Not only would these cuts harm Hispanic seniors.  Medicaid provides health care to nearly 1 in 4 Latinos under 65 years old and nearly half of all Latino children.