BY ARGIRIS MALAPANIS
At a White House press conference January 28, President William Clinton said he does not rule out raising monthly premiums for Medicare recipients with income above a certain level - in other words instituting a form of means testing for the federal program that provides health coverage for the elderly and disabled.

A week earlier the Democratic president had announced he will seek $138 billion in cuts in Medicare when he presents his federal budget proposal to Congress, $22 billion more than what he offered to chop during his re-election campaign.

An article in the January 29 Wall Street Journal stated, "Republicans are hopeful that budget talks can produce an agreement with President Clinton to increase Medicare premiums, at least for upper-income beneficiaries."

In the absence of any protests from the organized labor movement, there is growing bipartisan convergence on how far to go in slashing Medicare, and now apparently in ending it as a social entitlement available to all without means testing.

"We keep talking about holding hands and jumping off together, but we're still saying, 'You first,' " stated Senate majority leader Trent Lott, referring to Clinton on the issue of pegging Medicare payments to one's income. "I'm prepared to meet with Senator Lott and discuss that and other issues," Clinton said at his White House news conference.

Working people won Medicare along with Medicaid, which provides medical coverage for low income families, in the 1960s, as a by-product of the civil rights movement and an extension of the Social Security Act of 1935.

The bipartisan propaganda campaign aimed at numbing labor opposition to slashing these social programs has been unfolding methodically ever since the November elections, with new twists and turns every week. Unlike the 1994-95 "Republican revolution," it is led by the Clinton administration and other prominent Democrats.

The latest trick is convincing working people that "upper-income" families should pay more toward the Medicare federal fund to save it from imminent bankruptcy and balance the federal budget. "Something has got to happen in the area of more affluent citizens in terms of the percentage that they pay," said Sen. Peter Domenici, a Republican from New Mexico and Budget Committee chairman.

But all the funds for Medicare, as well as Social Security and other entitlements, come out of the value workers produce that is appropriated by the bosses in the form of profit. The rulers' drive to slash the social wage has nothing to do with "responsibilities" of the wealthy. It has everything to do with reversing the decline in the profit rates of the capitalist class.

Most of the cuts Clinton announced he will propose when he unveils his federal budget on February 6, $91 billion, are to come from reducing federal payments to hospitals, health maintenance organizations (HMOs), and doctors. This will affect working people, because HMOs and hospitals will become less likely to serve Medicare patients and will offer lower quality care. The "affluent" can easily afford private, and better, health care programs.

Clinton's proposals also include raising the monthly premium Medicare recipients pay from an average $44 today to nearly $62 in five years.

Republicans, seeing the writing on the wall, are cautiously pushing for more, particularly establishing the principle that the amount of care anyone gets should be pegged to his or her income. "I don't think you can solve the problem legitimately just on the provider side," said Lott. "And I think he [Clinton] knows that."

Means testing has been widely used in the existing welfare programs as part of humiliating and demoralizing low-paid or jobless workers who depend on relief. These programs are staffed by bureaucrats and snoops who pry into every aspect of a person's life - how you spend your money, who you live with, whether or not you decide to bear a child.

Last year, Clinton signed the Welfare Reform Act, eliminating Aid to the Families with Dependent Children and other parts of the federal relief program - the first gutting of the Social Security Act in 60 years. Responsibility for disbursing the reduced welfare funds was placed on the states, some of which are now reapplying the more degrading aspects of means testing.

In Maine, for example, the state is reinstituting an old practice: when a family comes in to apply for welfare, a social worker assigned to the case will visit them at home. Home visits were abandoned in the 1970s when they became widely viewed as an invasion of privacy in the aftermath of the movements for Black freedom, women's equality, and against the Vietnam war.

Instituting a differential, pegged to personal income, on the premium recipients pay for Medicare coverage guts the character of the program as an entitlement. Winning federally funded health care programs available to all elderly and disabled people, regardless of income, was an essential part of the victories labor scored in its battle to expand working-class solidarity and undercut competition imposed by the wages system.

Some of the proposals floated now would require individuals whose income exceeds $60,000, or $80,000 for couples, to pay double the current premium. Once that principle is established, however, the cutoff point can be changed easily.

The leadership of the Republican Party in Congress has also announced it will push as a priority a bill that would do away with mandatory overtime pay. The "comp-time" bill would give employers the option of not paying workers time and a half for overtime. The bosses would instead give workers points for overtime that would be accumulated and workers would cash them in by getting time off after notifying the employer 30 days in advance.

The bill is being pushed under the pretext of helping working families have more flexible hours. "We have an opportunity to give families the time off they need to care for their children's school activities and in many cases, care for their elderly parents," said Rep. Susan Molinari, a Republican from New York. Clinton supported a slightly different version of such a bill during his election campaign last year, using arguments like Molinari's. Now he is warming up to signing such a measure.

"Though he opposed the GOP's effort last year," said an article in the January 28 Wall Street Journal, "President Clinton now says he might sign some form of comp-time legislation, provided it has safeguards sufficient to ward off potential employer abuses. Even some moderate Democrats are giving tacit approval."  
 
 
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