  Does President Obama Want to Impose a Crushing Burden on Our
Children?  Monday, 12 September 2011 08:40 By Dean Baker,
Truthout | News Analysis   • Print   • Email  Sorry deficit
fanatics, this one has nothing to do with the cost of the
stimulus or the deficits run up during the Obama years. We're
talking real money here. We're talking about plans to raise the
age of Medicare eligibility to 67.  To deficit hawks everywhere,
this is a great way to save the government money. Life
expectancy at age 65 is roughly 20 years. Therefore, raising the
age of eligibility for Medicare by two years would shave roughly
10 percent off the program's budget. (The actual saving would be
somewhat less since it is cheaper to treat people when they are
65 and 66 than in their 80s or 90s.) For a program that is
projected to cost more than $1 trillion a year (at 5 percent of
GDP) in a decade and even more in following decades, this would
amount to real savings.  But the cost of this savings is a much
higher health care bill for b