Coburn plan: Slash tuition help, health care - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

Coburn plan: Slash tuition help, health care

One of Senate’s most ardent deficit hawks has unveiled a $9 trillion deficit reduction plan, including a $1 trillion reduction in defense spending that would cut programs both big and small.

The plan from Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., includes a mix of tax increases and cuts in entitlement and discretionary spending programs. It calls for a lot of sacrifice, such as a three-year salary freeze for federal workers that excludes the military, and a change in how retiree cost-of-living adjustments are calculated that would affect military pensions.

His defense proposals from the report, titled “Back in Black,” include:

• Reduce by 90 percent the amount of money spent on tuition assistance for active-duty service members, which Coburn’s report says duplicates GI Bill benefits and is not a very cost-effective retention tool. This would save about $4.9 billion over 10 years.

• Consolidate military commissaries and exchanges into a single, nonsubsidized retail system over about five years, saving the government $9.1 billion over 10 years even if the government provided a $400 a year allowance to active-duty military families to make up for the estimated 7 percent hike in grocery prices.

• Eliminate the military’s Hollywood liaison offices that work with movie and television producers. This involves two people from the Air Force, three from the Coast Guard, four from the Marine Corps and four from the Navy; eliminating those slots would save about $1.2 million a year.

• Close the 64 schools for military dependents located on bases in the U.S., saving $10 billion over 10 years. The 26,000 student who attend the schools instead would be sent to local public schools.

• Terminate Defense Department-funded math, science, technology and education programs at public elementary schools, programs that have existed since 1958.

• Reduce funding for the National Guard counterdrug program, including free training provided to law enforcement agencies. This would save $250 million over 10 years.

• Overhaul military health care to bar retirees from signing up for Tricare Prime, the military health insurance option with the lowest out-of-pocket costs. This would require retirees to pay about $2,000 in annual fees for an individual and $3,500 for a family. Additionally, annual deductions would increase over several years. The combination would save $115 billion over 10 years.

• Charge new out-of-pocket costs to Medicare-eligible military retirees covered by the Tricare for Life program. Coburn proposes a $550 deductible before Tricare benefits kicked in, a move that would save $43 billion over 10 years.

Coburn’s aggressive debt reduction plan is unlikely to pass, at least not any time soon, as Senate leaders are focusing on a slightly more modest $4 trillion in reductions. But Coburn is part of the so-called Gang of Six that is writing a Senate debt and spending plan that requires $80 billion in cuts in the defense budget, without providing specifics.

Coburn’s full report is online.