However, there is no denying that the past financial crisis and the ensuing recession coupled with the increasing number of participants entering retirement has taken a toll on the Social Security and Medicare Part A trust funds. In fact, the 2013 Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees annual reports found that the Social Security's retirement Trust Fund will be exhausted by 2033 and the Medicare's Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund will become insolvent by 202I believe in maintaining the strength of these programs and in order to protect future surpluses of these trust funds, Congress must first enact meaningful reforms to ensure they remain for current and future generations of beneficiaries. .Sources: "Social Security, Treasury Target Taxpayers For Their Parents' Decades-Old Debts," Marc Fisher, The Washington Post, April 10, 201 .The Congressional Budget Office recently estimated in their September budget outlook that Medicare outlays for 2020 would rise about 12 percent — roughly double the rate forecast by the Medicare Trustees in their April 2020 report. This suggests that the Medicare Part B premium increase for 2021 could be about .40 per month higher in 2021, rising from 4.60 to 2.00. But even this estimate does not include the impact of cost shifting due to protecting people with low Social Security benefits from reductions due to the high Medicare Part B increase. .Since 2000, cost-of-living-adjustments (COLAs) increased Social Security benefits a total of just 43 percent. Meanwhile typical senior expenses have jumped 86 percent, according to TSCL's 2017 Loss of Buying Power Study. The following table illustrates ten of the fastest growing costs since 2000. .Let's be clear about this, this is the responsibility of the Ways and Means Committee, and specifically this subcommittee. .Now, the Associated Press has reported that one administration official has said the odds are 75-25 that the program will not happen at all. .If signed into law, the Social Security Protection and Truth in Budgeting Act would amend the Social Security Act to ensure that receipts and disbursements of the Social Security Trust Funds are not included in a unified federal budget. It would also mandate that Trust Fund monies cannot be diverted to create private accounts. .Nearly 50 years ago, we made a promise to ensure quality, affordable healthcare for all American seniors. In order to protect that promise, we must promote excellence and efficiency in Medicare, while being more fiscally responsible. One of the most important ways we can achieve those critical goals is to fix the broken Medicare physician payment system, which has created uncertainty and instability for seniors, healthcare providers, and the federal budget for decades. Because of the failed physician payment system, there is a looming crisis facing seniors and the doctors who care for them: on January 1, 2013 doctors could be hit with a scheduled reduction in Medicare payments of more than 30 percent. .The audit is part of long-delayed plans to recover money that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) says it overpaid to plans that exaggerated the severity of illnesses of patients treated. The problem is one that the federal government has struggled with, unsuccessfully, for more than a decade. According to one estimate that appeared in Health Affairs, CMS will overpay Medicare Advantage plans by 0 billion over the next decade if the current "coding intensity adjustment" system remains in place.