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Bernie Sanders' "Medicare for All" would cost $32.6 Trillion Dollars

UCFKnight85

UCFKnight85

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Over 10 years. Or, an additional $3.2 Trillion dollars in federal spending annually, on top of a budget that is now just $3.8T.

Socialism rules! Errr, sorry - "Democratic Socialism"! We just need a few richies to pay their fair share and we're there!

And before anyone whines about the fact that this came out of a libertarian think tank, keep reading since it states clearly that this is pretty much in line with other independent studies, stating the cost to be anywhere between $27T - $32T.

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/study-medicare-bill-estimated-326-trillion-56906940
 
Starting your daily "whiny little bitch about how mean Democrats are" thread a little early, aren't we?
 
While I am against it, you could easily double the Medicare/Medicaid taxes. Companies would no longer be paying for Ins, so for many businesses their cost would drop or the increase would be small. People who now have personal ins have to pay it already, and Those who business purchased ins usually have employee payment towards the ins.
 
goodknightfl said:
While I am against it, you could easily double the Medicare/Medicaid taxes. Companies would no longer be paying for Ins, so for many businesses their cost would drop or the increase would be small. People who now have personal ins have to pay it already, and Those who business purchased ins usually have employee payment towards the ins.
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Yea, and that wouldn't even make a dent in covering the cost of this. Not when you dump the entire private sector and throw everyone onto government health care.

We'd need another $3.2T in addition to the $3.8T we're spending today. You'd have to gouge every single person, industry, and business to do that.
 
goodknightfl said:
While I am against it, you could easily double the Medicare/Medicaid taxes. Companies would no longer be paying for Ins, so for many businesses their cost would drop or the increase would be small. People who now have personal ins have to pay it already, and Those who business purchased ins usually have employee payment towards the ins.
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Part of the argument for “single payer” is that companies shouldn’t shoulder the burden of insurance. Removing the voluntary healthcare expenditure and replacing it with a mandatory tax at a possible increase lays bare the lie in that selling point. Also, making it a tax that businesses pay mean that you are adding a burden to small businesses that don’t currently provide healthcare because their margins are too small to allow for it.
 
Here's another important snippet from the study: even if we DOUBLED all current tax collections on both individuals and corporations, it still wouldn't even fund the annual increase to pay for this. So, even if the Corporate rate skyrocketed to 42% and the top individual rate skyrocketed to north of 70%, it'd still come short.

This is why you have to call major, major bullshit on these socialists when they claim everything can be paid by taxing rich people a smidge more.

These estimates are conservative because they assume the legislation achieves its sponsors’ goals of dramatically reducing payments to health providers, in addition to substantially reducing drug prices and administrative costs.

A doubling of all currently projected federal individual and corporate income tax collections would be insufficient to finance the added federal costs of the plan.
 
UCFKnight85 said:
Here's another important snippet from the study: even if we DOUBLED all current tax collections on both individuals and corporations, it still wouldn't even fund the annual increase to pay for this. So, even if the Corporate rate skyrocketed to 42% and the top individual rate skyrocketed to north of 70%, it'd still come short.

This is why you have to call major, major bullshit on these socialists when they claim everything can be paid by taxing rich people a smidge more.

These estimates are conservative because they assume the legislation achieves its sponsors’ goals of dramatically reducing payments to health providers, in addition to substantially reducing drug prices and administrative costs.

A doubling of all currently projected federal individual and corporate income tax collections would be insufficient to finance the added federal costs of the plan.
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LMAO as if the Republicans care about paying for all the shit they pass. Your idiot in Chief is in charge of a Trillion dollar deficit.
 
How much are they accounting for the negative effect of higher corporate taxes on the economy and tax revenue?
 
sk8knight said:
How much are they accounting for the negative effect of higher corporate taxes on the economy and tax revenue?
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They don't. They just figured what doubling current taxes would do in relation to cost.

But you're right- that amount of taxation would strangle the economy and surely throw us into deep recession.
 
Let’s say that this was successful and cut healthcare costs across the board 50%. Is that good or bad for the economy as a whole?

EDIT: we’ll ignore the cost of the huge government agency that would be created to manage this.
 
the va is essentially healthcare for all. they dont even have to cover 1% of our population. i dont think ive ever heard anyone claim that the va was awesome. we should definitely expand that to everyone in the country.*
 
The average family plan health insurance costs employers $12,500 per year.

Companies get to drop that cost. They have to pay more in taxes. It's not as insane as you're making it seem.
 
Between medicare and medicaid, the US governments already pay for 1/3rd of all healthcare spending and cover about 30% of the population. All things being equal, adding the remaining population should only add 2.2 trillion per year, the amount being paid privately now.
 
fried-chicken said:
The average family plan health insurance costs employers $12,500 per year.

Companies get to drop that cost. They have to pay more in taxes. It's not as insane as you're making it seem.
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This study, and other studies before them, have already disproven your theory. The savings from not covering employees would be far exceeded by the hike in taxes required.
 
fried-chicken said:
England does it for $2700 per person.
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[roll] And the British NHS is a total disaster. Bravo!

Are you throwing these numbers around in hopes that they somehow disprove the now consensus that Medicare for All will cost at least $2.6 T - $3.2 T per year in new, additional spending?

There's a reason that Bernie Sander's own office has admitted that they haven't assessed the cost of his plan or how to pay for it. Because as soon as they admit that these numbers are valid, socialists everywhere die a little inside.
 
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This study is estimating about 10k per person. Exactly what we pay now in public and private dollars... except not everyone is covered now.

So if we can get healthcare to everyone for the same price we're paying now, why's that bad?

If we can eliminate delinquency and medical collections that ruin lives for the same cost, why's that bad?

If we can somehow put pressure on hospitals so they can't charge $25 for a halls cough drop, how is that bad?
 
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3.3 trillion is what we spent in 2017.

This is 3.2 trillion. We could save 100 billion dollars before we put downward pressure on prices?

And EVERYONE is covered?

Sounds great!
 
"If we can somehow put pressure on hospitals so they can't charge $25 for a halls cough drop, how is that bad?"

You can do that now, its a byproduct of people actually being responsible for themselves. You don't HAVE to get a 4,000 dollar MRI when you have a kidney stone. You don't HAVE to pay for luxury accommodations when giving birth.

Its the same as its always been, when you can command a service that someone else is paying for then you're going to run the bill up. The only wall preventing that in single.payer is the federal governments bureaucrats, and as we've seen time and time again it isnt cost effective...
 
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Crazyhole said:
"If we can somehow put pressure on hospitals so they can't charge $25 for a halls cough drop, how is that bad?"

You can do that now, its a byproduct of people actually being responsible for themselves. You don't HAVE to get a 4,000 dollar MRI when you have a kidney stone. You don't HAVE to pay for luxury accommodations when giving birth.

Its the same as its always been, when you can command a service that someone else is paying for then you're going to run the bill up. The only wall preventing that in single.payer is the federal governments bureaucrats, and as we've seen time and time again it isnt cost effective...
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When you're sick, like really sick. You don't have access to the free market. You have access to the services at the hospital you're at.
 
Also @Crazyhole arguing against paying for scans when you're sick is about the most I've disagreed with one of your takes ever.

That has to be the all time worst advice.
 
fried-chicken said:
When you're sick, like really sick. You don't have access to the free market. You have access to the services at the hospital you're at.
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Whats the difference between your hospital calling an insurance company or calling the federal government when it comes to authorization for treatment?
 
fried-chicken said:
Additional government spending.
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Uh yea. No shit. $3.2T in addition to what we already spend today. In order words, a Federal budget that is nearly 100% bigger than it is today, pushing $7T per year.

Not to mention we would be destroying 1/5 of our economy overnight.
 
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UCFKnight85 said:
Uh yea. No shit. $3.2T in addition to what we already spend today. In order words, a Federal budget that is nearly 100% bigger than it is today, pushing $7T per year.

Not to mention we would be destroying 1/5 of our economy overnight.
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No we wouldn't be. Hospitals, doctors, prescription companies all continue to exist.
 
fried-chicken said:
Also @Crazyhole arguing against paying for scans when you're sick is about the most I've disagreed with one of your takes ever.

That has to be the all time worst advice.
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Really? I was a private payer for years. I went in to the hospital with kidney stones at one time and the doctor said he was 99% sure that was the issue but wanted a CT scan to make sure. 3 grand for it. I asked if it would make any difference in the long run and he said it wouldn't. I declined, and was sent home with a 9 dollar prescription for vicodin just like they would have done anyway. It passed, just as it would have anyway and I avoided a 3,000 dollar expense that would have otherwise been incurred if someone else was paying the bill. 2 years later we had a surgery performed on one of my daughters and had we let someone else pay it, it would have been 5 times what it actually cost. 2 years ago I had an elective surgery and paid 6 grand. The hospital mistakenly sent us the bill that would have gone to insurance if it wasnt private payer and it was 29,000+.

So where is the problem here? The 3rd party payer or the lack of direct consultation between the provider and the recipient? All you are advocating for is changing WHO the 3rd party payer is.
 
If government guaranteed payment for housing, would anyone care if the rent was 200 bucks or 20,000 bucks? If it isnt your money then the bill just gets bigger.
 
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Moving away from a private insurance model would do some pretty serious damage to the economy. In addition to their lost revenue (which equates to lost tax revenue), you'd have about 500K unemployed workers from the health insurance sector who would need new jobs, and there could be some care providers who choose to move out of the country. There's a fair amount of providers already who won't take medicare and/or are moving into a VIP-style practice. I suspect more would do the same.
 
Crazyhole said:
Really? I was a private payer for years. I went in to the hospital with kidney stones at one time and the doctor said he was 99% sure that was the issue but wanted a CT scan to make sure. 3 grand for it. I asked if it would make any difference in the long run and he said it wouldn't. I declined, and was sent home with a 9 dollar prescription for vicodin just like they would have done anyway. It passed, just as it would have anyway and I avoided a 3,000 dollar expense that would have otherwise been incurred if someone else was paying the bill. 2 years later we had a surgery performed on one of my daughters and had we let someone else pay it, it would have been 5 times what it actually cost. 2 years ago I had an elective surgery and paid 6 grand. The hospital mistakenly sent us the bill that would have gone to insurance if it wasnt private payer and it was 29,000+.

So where is the problem here? The 3rd party payer or the lack of direct consultation between the provider and the recipient? All you are advocating for is changing WHO the 3rd party payer is.
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You didn't give yourself the best care and got lucky. That could have been cancer. If it was, early detection could have saved your life.

From a financial aspect imagine if it was cancer and you were a private payer. Guess what, you're now a public burden for millions in treatment because you didn't want to spend 3k.

No one should ever skip top notch diagnosis over cost and that's why diagnosis should be free.
 
Crazyhole said:
If government guaranteed payment for housing, would anyone care if the rent was 200 bucks or 20,000 bucks? If it isnt your money then the bill just gets bigger.
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This is a misunderstanding on your part on how Medicare works.
 
CommuterBob said:
Moving away from a private insurance model would do some pretty serious damage to the economy. In addition to their lost revenue (which equates to lost tax revenue), you'd have about 500K unemployed workers from the health insurance sector who would need new jobs, and there could be some care providers who choose to move out of the country. There's a fair amount of providers already who won't take medicare and/or are moving into a VIP-style practice. I suspect more would do the same.
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Do away with insurance altogether and prices drop significantly. Turn insurance over to the federal government who has an unlimited supply of money and the opposite will happen.

As far as doctors refusing medicare patients, it isnt because of the money. Its because of the ridiculous amount of paperwork and regulation that goes into treatment. Penalties for delinquent or non-conforming paperwork can be 3-4 times what a provider charges, and it can come years after treatment.
 
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CommuterBob said:
Moving away from a private insurance model would do some pretty serious damage to the economy. In addition to their lost revenue (which equates to lost tax revenue), you'd have about 500K unemployed workers from the health insurance sector who would need new jobs, and there could be some care providers who choose to move out of the country. There's a fair amount of providers already who won't take medicare and/or are moving into a VIP-style practice. I suspect more would do the same.
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Most of the process would remain the same and these workers would fill possitions doing the same thing they do now or different variations of it.
 
fried-chicken said:
You didn't give yourself the best care and got lucky. That could have been cancer. If it was, early detection could have saved your life.

From a financial aspect imagine if it was cancer and you were a private payer. Guess what, you're now a public burden for millions in treatment because you didn't want to spend 3k.

No one should ever skip top notch diagnosis over cost and that's why diagnosis should be free.
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The care was identical. There was no chance it was cancer.
 
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