March 7 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden will seek to raise the Medicare tax on high earners and push for more drug price negotiations to help keep the federal health insurance program solvent through at least 2050 as part of his budget proposal this week, the White House said.
His idea quickly ran into opposition in Congress, where Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell predicted that it would never pass the Republican-controlled House of Representatives.
The tax increase from 3.8% to 5% on earned and unearned income above $400,000 is part of a package of proposals aimed at extending the solvency of Medicare’s Hospital Insurance Trust Fund by at least 25 years, the White House said in a statement on Tuesday.
“Let’s ask the wealthiest to pay just a little bit more of their fair share, to strengthen Medicare for everyone over the long term,” Biden wrote separately in a New York Times guest essaythat was published on Tuesday.
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Biden has sought to link Republicans to the idea of cutting funding for the insurance program for seniors and the disabled as part of negotiations over increasing the United States’ $31.4 trillion debt limit. Biden’s Democrats control the Senate, but Republicans have a narrow majority in the House.
The Democratic president has pledged to offer his vision for funding Medicare and challenged Republicans to offer their own.
“Thank goodness the House is Republican,” McConnell told reporters at a press conference.
“Massive tax increases, more spending. All of which the American people can thank the Republican House for will not see the light of day,” he said.
The president is scheduled to unveil his budget on Thursday, including a speech in Philadelphia to highlight his plan.
Biden called the rate increase “modest,” adding in the Times: “When Medicare was passed, the wealthiest 1% of Americans didn’t have more than five times the wealth of the bottom 50 percent combined, and it only makes sense that some adjustments be made to reflect that reality today.”
His proposal also seeks to close loopholes that allow high earners to shield some of their income from the tax, the White House said.
The Inflation Reduction Act, passed by Democrats last year, authorizes Medicare to negotiate prices for high-cost drugs. The budget proposal would allow Medicare to negotiate prices for more drugs and to do so sooner after they launch, saving $200 billion over 10 years, the White House said.
Without any action, the most recent Medicare Trustees Report projected that the trust fund would be insolvent in 2028.
Some House Republicans have said Medicare along with Social Security, which delivers retirement and disability payments, should be part of any budget negotiations. While popular, the two programs account for about one-third of federal spending, according to the Congressional Budget Office, and are expected to grow as the U.S. population ages.
Reporting By Jarrett Renshaw; additional reporting by Richard Cowan and Katharine Jackson;
Editing by Shri Navaratnam Chizu Nomiyama, Aurora Ellis
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