SPECTRUM: Where I stand on Medicare, Social Security, and the ACA

Alaskans strongly support both Medicare and Social Security. Through Medicare, older Americans are largely protected from ruinous healthcare costs. Through Social Security, Americans can retire with dignity and not face poverty because of disability or a loved one’s death. And through the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which must be reformed to achieve its potential, millions of our most vulnerable citizens now have access to health care. As your U.S. Senator, I will make sure that these programs remain strong, available, and accessible.

Before Medicare was enacted in 1965, many older adults were uninsured. Today, 55 million Americans, and 98 percent of those age 65 and older, are insured, including more than 80,000 Alaskans. Reforms are needed to strengthen the program, include providing an option for individuals to buy into Medicare at a younger age and eliminating the prohibition on Medicare negotiating drug prices—a prohibition that is a giveaway to drug companies and their PACs and lobbyists. This legislative change will require strong leaders in Washington who can stand up to these corporate interests.

Rather than improving Medicare, Lisa Murkowski repeatedly has voted to convert the program into a complicated and unworkable voucher system under which Alaskans would be forced to use vouchers to buy either private insurance or Medicare. Under Murkowski’s plan, Medicare would have to develop its own premium structure and beneficiaries may have to use their own funds in addition to vouchers to remain in the program. In addition, because growth in Medicare spending would be based on a formula that is below the typical annual increase in healthcare costs, vouchers annually would purchase less coverage. Under this complex, unworkable formula, Alaskans would lose coverage and pay more.

I oppose converting Medicare into a voucher system. Most Alaskans are dependent on Medicare or are counting on receiving it when they retire. Medicare benefits must be 100 percent protected.

Like Medicare, Social Security works for Alaska, providing retirement benefits as well as life insurance and disability insurance for younger workers. Social Security provided benefits to more than 60 million Americans, including more than 90,000 Alaskans in 2015. These beneficiaries received Social Security benefits totaling $1.3 billion, with the average benefit being $13,984. Importantly, Social Security lifted 29,000 Alaskans out of poverty in 2013.

Like Medicare, Social Security must be reformed, because current projections show that the Social Security trust funds could be exhausted in 2034. Proposed reform options include raising the full retirement age from 67 to 70; cutting benefits; and increasing the revenue raised by the payroll tax.

Unlike Lisa Murkowski, I oppose raising the full retirement age because such an increase would prove challenging for people working in physically taxing jobs—including those in construction, fishing, and mining. I also oppose cutting benefits because such cuts would cause significant hardships. I do support asking the wealthiest Americans to pay more by eliminating the Social Security income cap and taxing all of their income.

While Medicare and Social Security have served Americans for decades, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is a new program that needs reforms so that it will work and stand the test of time. I share the goal of most Alaskans of improving the ACA, rather than repealing it and replacing it with nothing. I oppose taking away health insurance from thousands of Alaskans and removing hundreds of millions of federal dollars from our struggling economy. We must fix the ACA by increasing cost transparency, rewarding outcomes rather than the number of procedures, and permitting regional and national insurance policies.

Lisa Murkowski once said that repealing the ACA was not the answer because repealing it without replacing it would not address needed healthcare reform. She then flip-flopped, most recently voting to repeal the ACA without a replacement—a move that would pull hundreds of millions of Federal dollars out of Alaska and cause thousands of Alaskans to lose their health coverage.

We need leaders in Washington who will stand up for Alaska and get things done. We need leaders in Washington who will push back against drug companies and special interests. That is why I am running as an Independent and why I am not accepting corporate PAC money. As an Independent candidate to the Senate from Alaska, I am beholden to no political party. No party bosses will stop me from doing the job that Alaskans elect me to do. I will advance reasonable, rational, pragmatic solutions to the systemic problems facing our state and country. I will seek out and advocate for the best ideas – regardless of which party they come from – to help solve pressing problems. With independent leadership, we can again make Washington work for the people.

Margaret Stock is an Independent Candidate for the U.S. Senate