Another day, it's another front page article in the Washington Post about the budget deficit. The Post has apparently not not heard about the economic downturn that has the rest of the country concerned. The article includes a comment about "the looming challenge of skyrocketing Medicare and Social Security spending. " Of course Social Security spending is not projected to skyrocket. It is projected to increase gradually, and its costs are fully covered by its own tax stream until 2048, according to the Congressional Budget Office's latest projections. The cause of skyrocketing Medicare care costs are the sharp projected rise in health care costs, but the Post doesn't want to talk about health care reform.
--Dean Baker
