We’ve Been Robbed $2.8 Billion – By The AARP

Grey Dawn! As polling shows, seniors and white Americans over the age of 65 generally don’t support PresidentObama or his health care reform bill. They are appalled at the $716 billion in Medicare cuts, which will be used to expand coverage (and dependency) for lower income Americans – so why does the AARP support it? Avik Roy, an advisor to the Romney campaign, penned a column in Forbes over the weekend detailing how AARP will gain almost $3 billion from Obamacare “according to an explosive new report from Sen. Jim DeMint (R., S.C.), [stating the] same Medicare cuts will give the AARP a windfall of $1 billion in insurance profits, and preserve another $1.8 billion that AARP already generates from its business interests.” Roy explains that AARP “in 2011…generated $458 million in royalty fees from so-called “Medigap” plans, nearly twice the $266 million the lobby receives in membership dues. Medigap plans are private insurance plans that seniors buy to cover the things that traditional, government-run Medicare doesn’t, like catastrophic coverage. Medigap plans also help seniors eliminate the co-pays and deductibles that are designed to restrain wasteful Medicare spending.” However, AARP blocked reforms for their insurance plans during the health care fiasco –which would have saved $415 per senior in premiums. However, the organization fought incessantly to keep those reforms out of Obamacare because they receive a 4.95% royalty on every dollar a senior spends on Medigap. The cost of reform would have been $1.8 billion over ten years. More