Military Officer - March 2008 - (Page 31) washingtonscene The FY 2009 budget plan is likely to include a DoD task force’s recommendations to raise retiree TRICARE fees by $1,000 to $2,000 a year, depending on retired pay level. L E G I S L AT I V E N E W S T H AT A F F E C T S Y O U $2,000 Officer Tax A s this column was being written, the president’s FY 2009 budget proposal had yet to be released. But MOAA fully expects the administration’s request again will propose significant TRICARE fee increases for military retirees, just as it has for the past two years. In 2007 and 2008, Congress rejected those fee increases and directed a review of the issue by the DoD Task Force on the Future of Military Health Care. As reported in last month’s “Washington Scene,” that task force now has submitted its recommendations to the secretary of Defense and Congress — calling for fee increases that, in many cases, are even larger than those previously proposed by the Pentagon. When the task force was first appointed, many retirees were skeptical about the group’s objectivity. Because half of the task force members worked for the secretary of Defense, and the secretary appointed the other half, many questioned how likely it would be that they would recommend something less than what the secretary has been pushing so adamantly. Task force members vehemently objected to such questions and strongly asserted their complete independence. While giving them full credit for the sincerity of those protestations, now that we’ve seen their final recommendations, it’s hard to say they’re much different from what would have been expected had they been all the way in the secretary’s pocket. While MOAA and other association representatives were afforded opportunities to provide our input to the task force, it’s difficult to see where any of that input was given much serious consideration. On the other hand, the task force report pretty much accepts at face value all of the cost data provided by DoD. From MOAA’s standpoint, it’s fundamentally out of balance to spend the vast majority of the report regurgitating DoD’s health cost argument and barely a few sentences acknowledging what military people have earned in the way of health coverage in return for decades of service and sacrifice. Nowhere in the report does it address The Military Coalition (TMC) and MOAA’s argument that extraordinary sacrifice — which so few Americans are willing to endure for one tour of duty, let alone 20 to 30 years — constitutes a very sizeable prepayment of premiums. What military beneficiaries object to so strongly is that focusing solely on the level of beneficiaries’ cash payments has the moral effect of devaluing their years of service. What’s the extent of that devaluation? It’s the $1,000 to $2,000 a year in extra fees that retired beneficiaries and some currently serving families will have to pay if the recommendations are implemented. MARCH 2008 ACT NOW! STOP OFFICER TAX ■ Please sign, stamp, and mail the postcards on the cover of this magazine to tell your legislators how important it is to you that Congress rejects imposing unfair increases of military health fees. MILITARY OFFICER 31
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