63% Say Medicare Costs Can Be Reduced Without Hurting Quality of Care

Most voters think it’s possible to cut Medicare costs without damaging the existing quality of care but believe it can’t be done unless the overall cost of health care in America comes down.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 63% of Likely U.S. Voters feel it is possible to reduce the cost of Medicare without hurting the quality of health care for senior citizens. Just 20% disagree and think the quality of care will suffer if Medicare costs are reduced. Seventeen percent (17%) are not sure. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

Voters over the age of 50 are slightly more skeptical than those who are younger that the cost of Medicare can be reduced without hurting the quality of care.

But 54% of all voters believe it is necessary to reduce the cost of health care services in the United States in order to reduce the cost of Medicare. Thirty percent (30%) think changing Medicare is what is necessary to bring the program’s costs down.

While voters have said for years that they favor cutting the size of the federal budget, only recently have a majority of voters come to understand that most of the budget goes to national defense, Medicare and Social Security. But 64% say any proposed changes in either Social Security or Medicare should be submitted to the American people for a vote before they can become law.

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The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on June 21, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.