Imagine you are a trillionaire and your mother can’t afford healthcare. What would you do?

Imagine you are several Trillion (not just billion or million) dollars rich, and your mother needs home healthcare she can’t afford. What would you do?

Assuming you are a decent person who cares about your mother, you surely would pay for her health care.

The sole purpose of government is to improve and protect the lives of the people. And the U.S. government, being Monetarily Sovereign, does not use tax dollars to pay its bills.

The government is infinitely rich, far wealthier than any person who ever has lived. It creates dollars, ad hoc, every time it pays a bill.

It is the federal government’s absolute duty to protect its citizens’ lives, especially the most vulnerable — the poor, the sick, and the aged.

Unfortunately, our representatives in the U.S. government do not accept their sole purpose.

They do not seem to recognize that we pay them to improve and protect our lives. They are failing at their job.

Aging America faces a senior care crisis; April Rubin,

As of 2021, A map of the U.S. shows the share of adults ages 75+ who cannot afford daily in-home care by metro area.

In all metro areas shown, the majority cannot afford in-home care.

The Northeast and Rust Belt have exceptionally high rates of adults unable to afford in-home care. Values range from 71% unable to afford care in D.C. to 94% in Springfield, Mass. 

If you were as wealthy as the federal government, you, being a good person, would support the poor, the sick, and the aged. Why don’t our representatives in the federal government? What is their excuse?

As America’s population of seniors grows, affordable long-term care is increasingly difficult. 

According to Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, nearly 70% of older adults will need long-term care services. Medicare doesn’t cover these services.

Why does Medicare not cover these services? The federal government has the infinite ability to create dollars. It has the infinite ability to afford whatever it wishes and do it without levying taxes.

So why do our federal representatives pretend Medicare can’t afford to protect the lives of our poor, sick, and/or elderly?

Medicaid often has long wait lists for at-home support, said Samara Scheckler, a research associate. “The cost of daily assistance at home is out of reach for most,” Scheckler said, “and so is assisted living, which bundles housing and care together.”

The cost of daily assistance at home is not out of reach for the federal government. Why do our government representatives not do what we pay them to do?

By the numbers: 13% of adults 75+ in U.S. metro areas living alone can afford assisted living without diving into assets, per the Center. 14% can afford a daily visit from a home health aide along with their housing costs.

Those percentages are disgraceful. If you heard that only 13% of the parents of trillionaires were able to afford assisted living, you would be disgusted and outraged. Where is the disgust and outrage for our federal government representatives?

Why do we allow them to still have their jobs?

For context, more than 40% of Americans 65 and older live alone. When considering seniors over 80, that share jumps to nearly 60%.

There’s also a growing shortage of care providers. While most people prefer in-home care — and it’s cheaper for states to fund — not everyone can receive care at home, said Priya Chidambaram of KFF.

Many seniors require the resources and medical equipment at more extensive facilities. This year, every U.S. state reported a shortage of care workers — and 43 of them saw permanent closures of care facilities, such as group homes and assisted living centers, according to a KFF survey.

You can be sure that the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the White House do not suffer from a shortage of assistants to do the multitude of errands our elected officials demand. Why does the federal government not fund care workers and care facilities?

I’ll tell you why: You don’t demand it. 

You have been suckered into believing the Big Lie that the federal government can’t afford to spend more. You have fallen for the right-wing lies that the government is running short of dollars or that spending causes inflation.

The Big Truth: The government is capable of infinite spending without levying taxes, and government spending does not cause inflation.

Inflation is caused by shortages of critical goods and services — usually oil and food — and government spending cures inflations by acquiring and supplying scarce goods and services.

According to a recent Wall Street Journal analysis, the U.S. has at least 600 fewer nursing homes than it did six years ago.

Many facilities are struggling to stay afloat. 81% of them would need additional workers to meet nursing staff requirements from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services proposed in September, KFF noted.

“Staffing shortages in nursing homes are hugely affecting those who need institutional care,” Chidambaram said.

Federally funded Medicare should support nursing homes and pay for the workers and nursing staff’s requirements.

U.S. life expectancy is on the rise. With that, care needs to last longer. A vast majority of older adults live in homes that they rent or own. According to the report, the need for services and support — like housework, bathing, or medicating — is expected to increase.

Baby boomers had fewer children than older generations, making family help increasingly limited for aging adults, Scheckler said.

Forcing families to fund elder care transfers a financial burden from the Monetarily Sovereign government (where it is no burden) to monetarily non-sovereign people, where it can be severe.

The bottom line is that the combined costs of housing and daily care are beyond most people’s means, said Jennifer Molinsky, project director for Harvard’s Housing and Aging Society program.

But it’s not beyond the federal government’s infinite means.

“It’s wonderful that the older population is growing overall, and people are living longer than a generation ago,” she said. “But the supports that people need to stay in the community, stay in their home are really expensive and hard to secure,”

The support that people need to stay in the community is well within the capabilities of the Monetarily Sovereign federal government.

Senior healthcare usage is up.

UnitedHealth says: Rising demand for behavioral care and Medicare outpatient procedures are squeezing some of UnitedHealth Group’s business segments but didn’t stop the industry giant from beating Wall Street’s expectations and posting earnings of $5.47 billion in Q2.

If the federal government, rather than the private sector, funded UnitedHealth Group’s business segments, $5.47 billion in growth dollars would enter the economy.

Why it matters: The parent of the biggest U.S. health insurer is a bellwether for broad industry trends. Reuters reported that despite higher-than-expected utilization and concern about how that could drive up health costs, the increases were less than some feared.

The insurer also revised its projected year-end earnings, soaring its share price. What they’re saying: “Outpatient care activity among seniors was a few hundred basis points above our expectations,” said John Rex, UnitedHealth’s chief financial officer.

Its “projected year-end earnings” came from people. If they had come from the federal government, the economy would have grown $5/47 billion more.

More Americans are also seeking behavioral care for anxiety, depression, and substance use disorder, reflecting an increasing ease with seeking help, executives said. But, Rex said: “Overall care activity among our Medicaid and commercial populations is consistent with our expectations.”

What to watch: How much premiums go up next year, particularly in the Medicare Advantage market.

Medicare Advantage has many requirements based on the profit motives of healthcare suppliers. If the federal government were doing its job, these requirements would disappear, and people would receive more complete care.

On its investor call Friday, UnitedHealth executives said their rate filings assume Medicare business will remain elevated and factor in added care costs.

In English, because they expect costs to rise, UnitedHealth will raise your prices on what the federal government could and should provide free.

At the same time, they stressed that they would “provide stability to the benefits that seniors value most,” such as zero co-pays for primary care visits and Tier 1 drugs and keeping level out-of-pocket maximums.

With federal funding, you would have co-pays, drug Tiers, or out-of-pocket maximums.

The intrigue: Insurers have been closely watching to see if deferred care during the pandemic results in more advanced cases in areas such as cancer or cardiovascular disease.

If there are more such cases, your insurance rates will rise.

SUMMARY

Unlike you, me, businesses, and state/local governments, the federal government is Monetarily Sovereign. It has the infinite ability to pay for anything and is not funded by taxes.

Though all monetarily non-sovereign entities need income to pay their bills, the federal government needs no income. Because federal taxes do not fund federal spending, the only purposes of federal taxes are:

1. To control the economy by taxing what the government wishes to discourage and giving tax breaks to what the government wishes to reward, mainly the rich
2. To assure demand for the U.S. dollar by requiring that taxes be paid in dollars.
3. To make you believe (falsely) that any federal benefits you receive must be paid for by your taxes.

The federal government could and should provide comprehensive, no-deductible Medicare for every man, woman, and child in America without collecting taxes.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

Twitter: @rodgermitchell Search #monetarysovereignty
Facebook: Rodger Malcolm Mitchell

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The Sole Purpose of Government Is to Improve and Protect the Lives of the People.

MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY