Statement by Deborah Steelman, Member

March 6, 1998

• help in caring for our aging parents;
• assurance that the quality of health care for future seniors will not be compromised by the financial pressures within the Medicare system; and
• determination that future taxpayers will not bear a financial burden any greater than the one my generation bears today.

Attaining these goals will require changes in immigration and tax policy in addition to changes in the benefits and responsibilities of taxpayers and beneficiaries. I do not see these changes as an "exercise in painful choices," nor do I see these changes as anything to fear.

Today, we live and die very differently than we did in the 1950's when Medicare was first designed. In 1998, we are on the cusp of technological breakthroughs that will soon render the practice of medicine virtually unrecognizable. In the last decade, we have witnessed unprecedented change in the financing and delivery of health care. The pace and degree of that change will only intensify as science changes medicine. The quality of our health care is astonishing today and will be beyond most of our imaginations within a decade. All this, and in addition we have the strongest economy on earth.

We are not faced with a task of "painful choices," but with an invitation of amazing promise. I believe this Commission will be remembered for our success in marrying the promise of medicine, the wealth of our nation, the freedom of our people, and the needs of all generations in the common goal of modernizing Medicare for a new century.