As Medicare turned 60, Max Richtman urges Americans to stop the White House and Congress from shredding one of the greatest legacies of LBJ’s Great Society.
President Donald Trump with Cabinet members and others after signing the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” which slashes funding for Medicaid, on the South Lawn of the White House on July 4, 2025. (White House/Daniel Torok)
By Max Richtman
Common Dreams
Medicare recently turned 60 years old, marking the day when former U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the program into law on July 30, 1965, giving seniors a guarantee of health coverage that never existed before.
Prior to Medicare’s enactment, it was nearly impossible for older people to obtain health insurance, as they were considered a “bad risk.”
Medicare provides universal coverage to Americans over 65 years of age. The law created Medicare Part A as a national hospital insurance program. Part B is a voluntary program for doctor visits and other medical services.
Medicare Part C is another name for the privatized, for-profit version of the program called “Medicare Advantage.” And Part D is the prescription drug program enacted in 2003.
The Hospital Insurance portion is funded through workers’ payroll contributions. At the signing ceremony in Independence, Missouri, LBJ said,
“Through this new law, every citizen will be able, in their productive years when they are earning, to insure themselves against the ravages of illness in his old age.”
Lyndon Johnson paid tribute to former President Harry S. Truman, presenting him with the very first Medicare card. It was Truman who, 20 years earlier, had proposed a form of universal medical coverage for the American people.
LBJ quoted Truman’s remarks from the 1940s:
“Millions of our citizens do not now have a full measure of opportunity to achieve and to enjoy good health. Millions do not now have protection or security against the economic effects of sickness. And the time has now arrived for action to help them attain that opportunity and to help them get that protection.”
It turned out that the time had not yet arrived.
Truman’s proposal failed to gain traction during a time of retrenchment from the expansions of the New Deal, and a Republican majority on Capitol Hill which he famously labeled the “Do-Nothing Congress.”
President Johnson’s determination to enact his Great Society agenda (of which Medicare was a large part) and sheer political muscle — not to mention solid Democratic control of Congress — pushed Medicare (and its sister program, Medicaid) into being.
LBJ signing the Medicare. Act, July 1965 with former President Harry Truman looking on. (Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Austin, Texas/Wikimedia Commons)
Naturally, Medicare faced strong opposition from conservatives. None other than Ronald Reagan made the ludicrous prediction that if Medicare were enacted,
“You and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it once was like in America when men were free.”
Sixty years later, we are no less “free” because of Medicare. In fact, having guaranteed healthcare makes seniors and people with disabilities (and their families) much more free — from disease, from worry, and financial ruin.
Today, 68 million people rely on Medicare for health coverage, including 12 million who are dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid.
Medicare isn’t perfect: The for-profit Medicare Advantage (Part C) program is extremely problematic (see below).
The Medicare Part A trust fund will become depleted in 2033 if Congress fails to take action to strengthen it. Traditional Medicare still doesn’t cover basic hearing, vision, and dental care — which the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare has been pushing for many years.
But most concerning of all — President Donald Trump and his party have spent this 60th anniversary year actively undermining both Medicare and Medicaid.
The “Unfair, Ugly” bill that Trump signed in July slashed nearly $1 trillion from Medicaid, which will strip health coverage from an estimated 10 to 16 million lower-income Americans. The new law — projected to add some $4 trillion to the national debt — could trigger cuts to Medicare down the road.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration is recklessly taking steps to privatize the entire Medicare program. It has announced a pilot project to involve private companies in conducting prior authorizations for care in traditional Medicare.
The administration, under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Director Mehmet Oz, also has announced a plan to automatically enroll new Medicare beneficiaries in the for-profit Medicare Advantage (MA) program — a huge gift to the multibillion dollar insurance industry at the expense of patients.
Oz addressing a White House event on health technology at the White House on Wednesday. (White House /Joyce N. Boghosian)
The problems with Medicare Advantage (MA) have become legendary. Enrollees are basically put into health maintenance organizations run by insurance giants, with limited networks of providers. Unreasonable denials of care are rampant. Patients who become disenchanted with MA plans often find it nearly impossible to switch to traditional Medicare.
Meanwhile, some MA Insurers have been overcharging the government for their services and ripping off taxpayers. (Several of these companies are currently under investigation.)
[See: Medicare Advantage Is Neither Medicare Nor an Advantage]
We are watching to see if the Trump administration, which talks a good game about lowering prescription medication costs while simultaneously doing favors for Big Pharma, will honor the provisions of President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which made myriad patient-friendly reforms to the Part D drug program —including out of pocket caps for beneficiaries and empowering Medicare to negotiate prices with the industry.
The bottom line is: Let’s not allow Trump and congressional Republicans to shred one of the greatest legacies of LBJ’s Great Society.
Advocacy groups are pushing back — and so is the grassroots “Hands Off” movement. But we don’t want to be fighting this same battle every time Medicare (and Medicaid) mark an anniversary when we should be purely celebrating.
Max Richtman is president and CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. He is former staff director at the United States Senate Special Committee on Aging.
This article is from Common Dreams.
The views expressed in this article and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
I have an Advantage plan and here’s why. There is no cap on out of pocket costs with regular Medicare. We could be bankrupted under certain circumstances. I also would not want to have to work in my mid seventies to pay for what is not covered. I do get some dental, drug and eye care coverage with my plan. Am I satisfied with it? Absolutely not. It’s still a ripoff. We need single payer. It’s the only rational solution. We can’t even get it passed in deep blue Massachusetts. We’ve been trying for decades. The deathcare lobby has our politicians in their grip. Money in politics is our #1 problem.
The author appears to be stuck in a 20th century partisan political framework. The US oligarchy that runs what passes for health care in the US will not allow a modern health system, that much has been clear for decades. If we recall when the Ds had majorities in both houses, and Obama they said single payer was “off the table”. Implying that the Ds represent a significant policy option is not accurate when both parties have clearly blocked the US from having a modern health system. At this point, I would hope that we all realize that electoral politics allone cannot fix the deep-seated institutional corruption we face.
Pity that neither so-called party have passed a health care act to create a truly comprehensive national health service. Every single other developed country, and many developing countries have some sort of universal health system. The UK has had the NHS for almost 80 years, for example. The US is woefully behind the times because it is obscenely profitable to maintain the status quo.
Whether this system is modeled on a UK style NHS type or a strictly regulated private system like in many European countries can be debated, but universal health care comes in many forms. But no, the US clings to a subsidized BigPharma and Insurance oligarchy using health extortion as the business model. That’s one reason I consider the US a type of kleptocracy.
Had the great firebrand populist Huey Long lived into old age, we’d all be enjoying Med4All today.
He was a huge inspiration for LBJ.
There was nothing like the Kingfish. He got shit done!
I have regular Medicare, not Medicare Advantage. Medicare Advantage is a ripoff, an attempt to privatize the whole program and I’m not falling for that. I also pay out of my own pocket supplemental health insurance and dental insurance. In order to be able to pay for this supplemental insurance, I have to work, even at age 76, to earn enough to cover those premiums. I believe that the ultra right-wing government wants us all to die.