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I'm no health care expert, but you've got technology that constantly advances the ability to extend life and maybe improve lifestyle. That puts constant upward pressure on health care costs.

In health care today, we spend most of the dollars - in terms of treating disease - in the last two years of a person's life.

It is certainly true that as we grow older, our need for healthcare also grows. It is also true that those who have lived their lives in the most difficult circumstances and experienced the most exhausting and challenging work places need healthcare the most.

We all understand that we are living longer, and we are more likely to spend more years as frail, elderly people who can't work. We also recognize that the wonderful advances in medicine also come with wonderful price tags. Those are things you can't budget around.

With the right care at the right time, a huge number of people could stay independent much longer, with a higher quality of life.

The key to the future in an aging society is not found in increasing just our life span; we need to increase our health span at the same time.

As the wealthiest nation on Earth, we have made a commitment to provide health care for those over 65. In order to pay for this, each of us should contribute the same, flat percentage of our earned income.

The way health care is funded in the U.S. is not sustainable. People are being kept alive who are probably better off dead. The cost of health care is too high, and you don't get much for it - it's twice as high in the U.S. as elsewhere, and it's because of the middlemen.

Modern medicine has presented us with a Faustian bargain: Our aging bodies can bankrupt our children and grandchildren. We have run into the 'law of diminishing returns' in health care, where we are often doing more and more, with higher and higher technology, at more and more cost, for less and less benefit.

This is a very difficult question. If you take a look at the aging population and demographics, we are going to have a big increase in the number of health care jobs needed in the state and in the country.