Medicare and the federal budget: Misdiagnosed problems, inadequate solutions.

The article focuses on federal budget and Medicare. It states that 20 percent of overall health care spending in the U.S. was accounted to Medicare. It says that the share of Medicare for national health expenditures (NHE) in federal actuaries project could be stable or decline between 2011 and 2019. It mentions that viewing health care costs through the lens of federal budgeting has been conventional. It adds that three major approaches to Medicare reform have been in reality including the voucher program, proposals to moderate program spending such as the Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), and the protection of federal budget through the direct reduction of program benefits.