“The Federal Government Will Spend Half Its Budget On Older Adults In Ten Years,” by Howard Gleckman, Forbes

“According to a new report by the Congressional Budget Office, the federal government spent about one-third of its budget on seniors in 2005 (see pages 12-14). By last year, the share grew to 40 percent, or $1.5 trillion. And by 2029, it will rise to half of all non-interest spending, or about $3 trillion. To put it another way, the government will spend about 10 percent of   the nation’s Gross Domestic Product on older adults. In 2005, it spent about 6 percent.”

LTC Comment (from Stephen A. Moses, President, Center for Long-Term Care Reform):

This author, an interminable advocate of bigger government spending for the elderly, now acknowledges that there are no easy solutions. But he still evades the fundamental problem. Excessive public support for the elderly over eight decades has reduced personal responsibility leaving too many aging Americans too dependent on social insurance and welfare programs. The only real solution is to wean the public off those programs before they implode entirely, a likely eventuality within the next decade. Implementing this solution will be much harder now because we’ve waited so long, but waiting longer will only make it exponentially worse.