Heritage experts analyses of Social Security and Medicare were featured in the June-July issues of AARP Magazine.

Heritage Foundation experts David John and Stuart Butler took to the pages of AARP Magazine to make the case for the essential reforms to Social Security and Medicare in our Saving the American Dream plan.

Heritage’s conservative message about how to ensure retirement and health security for seniors reached 20 million Americans through AARP Magazine. Absent reforms to entitlement programs, spending on these programs will grow unsustainably, forcing either ruinous tax hikes, benefit cuts, or both.

Butler, who directs Heritage’s Center for Policy Innovation, argues in the magazine for common sense Medicare reforms. Over five years, Heritage’s plan transforms Medicare from an unsustainable defined-benefit entitlement into a budgeted, defined-contribution program, much like members of Congress now enjoy. Continue Reading »

In December, Heritage’s Director for Policy Innovation Stuart Butler was invited to give remarks at the leading think tank of the American Left, the Brookings Institution. The topic of debate was “Should the Disadvantaged Be Spared from the Budget Axe?” Dr. Butler was invited to rebut the panel’s preestablished assertions that any budget cuts would hurt the poor. Up to the challenge, Butler, as the lone conservative on the panel, addressed the different ways that budget cuts would actually help poor Americans. As research has shown,  the policies of the Left have actually done more harm than good to the America’s poor.

While Butler noted the importance of protecting the poor from budget cuts on programs that are helpful, he also urged Congress to take an accurate accounting of which programs work, and which deserve to be cut.

Talk of shielding things from scrutiny in these tough budget times is what’s wrong with this discussion. It shouldn’t be an issue of shielding items from the budget discussion. We should instead be asking of all programs, not just those for the poor, “What is the objective that we’re trying to achieve, and is the program doing it effectively?”

In this week’s Heritage in Focus podcast, Bob Moffit discusses the legislative and legal avenues for repealing Obamacare. Moffit is a senior fellow at Heritage’s Center for Policy Innovation. David Weinberger hosts.

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