Medicare fund on a course to run dry by 2026 – “The Medicare Program is the second-largest social insurance program in the U.S., with 58.4 million beneficiaries and total expenditures of $710 billion in 2017. The Boards of Trustees for Medicare (also Boards) report annually to the Congress on the financial operations and actuarial status of the program. Beginning in 2002, there is one combined report discussing both the Hospital Insurance program (Medicare Part A) and the Supplementary Medical Insurance program (Medicare Part B and Prescription Drug Coverage). The Office of the Actuary in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) prepares the report under the direction of the Boards. The Boards of Trustees issued their most recent report on June 5, 2018. (Download the Report and the Data/ZIP file.) The Trustees Report is a detailed, lengthy document, containing a substantial amount of information on the past and estimated future financial operations of the Hospital Insurance and Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Funds (see the links in the Downloads section below). We recommend that readers begin with the “Overview” section of the report. This section is fairly short, is written in “plain English,” and summarizes all the key information concerning the expected financial outlook for Medicare. Substantial additional material is available in the later sections for those wishing to delve more deeply into the actuarial projections…”

Medicare has two Trust Funds: the Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund and the Supplementary Medical (SMI) Insurance Trust Fund. The Trustees project that the HI Trust Fund will pay full scheduled benefits until 2026…

Washington Post: “The financial future of the part of Medicare that pays older Americans’ hospital bills has deteriorated significantly, according to an annual government report that forecasts that the trust fund will be depleted by 2026 — three years sooner than expected a year ago. The report, issued Tuesday by a quartet of Trump administration officials who are trustees for Medicare and Social Security, reveals that policy changes ushered in by the president and the Republican Congress are weakening the financial underpinnings of the already-fragile insurance program. According to the report, less money will be flowing into the hospital-care trust fund in part because the tax law passed earlier this year will cause the government to collect less in income taxes. In addition, lower wages last year will translate into lower payroll taxes…”