Posted by Michael Wonder on 11 Jun 2019
Medicare for all won't work. This might.
12 June 2019 - About 30 million Americans still lack health insurance, and more than 60 million have trouble paying for the coverage they have. Together, that’s nearly one fourth of the U.S. population.
Health care affordability problems are so pervasive that more than half of Americans say they favor a national government health care system, such as Medicare for all. But moving to a giant, single-payer system would knock 150 million Americans off employer-provided care most of them like, and require sharp tax increases, besides. That makes it politically implausible.
But a more limited Medicare-like program for people who lack other options makes more sense. “It's a lot better to have a public option,” says Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado, one of the 23 Democrats running for president. “It would more quickly lead to universal health care coverage, which is what we should have as a country.”
