Healthcare Bill: $4.3 Trillion in 2017

Call me a cynic (who me?), but it seems with this news that the upcoming 10.1% pay cut in June for physicians won't be enough:

Government spending on health care could nearly double by 2017 to more than $2 trillion, according to a new federal study, reflecting a surge that promises to complicate the campaign debate about health care.

Driven by the aging of the baby-boom generation and rising costs of new drugs and medical technology, Medicare, the big federal health program for the elderly, will take up 20.7% of national health spending by 2017, according to the report.

Overall, the report projects health-care spending in the U.S. will hit $4.3 trillion by 2017, nearly double the 2007 amount.

Heck, why not make it an even 20.7% to keep costs the same? After all, doctors are clearly the cause of the problem.

-Wes