Eligibility of Civil Service Annuitants, Survivors, and Employees for Medicare

GAO provided information regarding the number of Civil Service annuitants, survivors, and employees eligible for Medicare who are either dependents of wage earners or wage earners principally in non-federal employment covered by the social security system.

GAO found that, as of December 1981: (1) about 81 percent of the Civil Service employees, annuitants, and survivors age 65 or older were also eligible for Medicare part A; (2) about 79 percent of the annuitants and survivors eligible for part A were eligible on their own account and not as dependents of other individuals; (3) Civil Service annuitants and survivors who were eligible for part A on their own account had fewer years of social security covered earnings and paid less hospital insurance tax than a random sample of Medicare part A beneficiaries who were eligible on their own account; and (4) depending upon the age group, between 13 and 82 percent of active Civil Service employees were fully insured for Medicare part A as of December 1981, and most of these individuals should have begun paying the hospital insurance tax in January 1983.