Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act) enabled millions of Americans to obtain medical care insurance. However, as widely reported, the Republicans’ so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” will cause many to lose their insurance, as more than 20 million Americans will see their insurance premiums spike at the end of this month, some by 2, 3, or more times what they have been paying.
For example, as I write this, there is a story in the local newspaper about a woman whose insurance premiums will rise from $552 per month to $2,240 per month. And this is typical.
Now might be a good time to discuss the alternative: “Medicare for All.” Even with Obamacare, approximately 27 million Americans are uninsured. I am a lifelong advocate of a national health plan that would provide medical care to everyone, as all other industrialized countries do.
Among the many pushbacks I would receive through the years is, “The [inept] United States government cannot handle anything as large as a national health plan.” This was something that Americans “knew,” because unbelievably, Richard Nixon succeeded in getting that outrageous drumbeat widely accepted during the time the United States was audaciously putting a man on the moon.
Following the statement about the federal government’s inabilities, I would get a question: “Do you want something like the Canadian system?” This question is based on years of hearing about long waits for care in Canada.
I would respond to these concerns by telling sceptics, “Yes, I would be extremely pleased if the U. S. would adopt a Canadian-style system. I would continue with, “The U.S. already has a national health plan for some of its citizens that is larger than the Canadian system.” In other words, there are more people on Medicare in the United States than the population of Canada.
Medicare is one of the most extensive health insurance programs in the world. Unfortunately, it is mainly limited to people 65 or older. Further, before Obamacare, there were many more people without medical insurance in the United States than live in Canada.
Fortunately, the tide has turned a bit in the last few years. Now, many Americans are beginning to see medical care as a right and want a plan that guarantees access for all citizens. The increasingly favorable attitudes toward a national health plan are the result of public discussions over the last decade or so. Democrats, led by Bernie Sanders, have pushed for universal medical care (e.g., Medicare for All).
But we have another problem to overcome—perceptions of cost. Many, if not most, Americans believe that a national health plan would be too costly.
Experts agree that a national health plan would be less expensive than our current system, not more expensive. Let’s assume, for the sake of comparison, that the cost of the actual medical care is the same regardless of who pays for it. That leaves us to compare the other expenses, including administrative costs such as billing and insurance-related activities. For Medicare, the administrative costs are only 2 per cent. Thus, the government can run an extensive plan efficiently. Traditional Medicare administrative costs are about 2 per cent of the program’s expenditures. At the same time, the overhead of private health insurance before the Affordable Care Act was much higher, at around 12-14 per cent.
Even with a tax increase to fund a national health care program, most Americans would pay less for health care than they do today, since premiums, co-pays, deductibles, and other out-of-pocket costs would be eliminated. They would pay more in taxes, but less in total taxes, medical insurance, and medical fees. We need more discussion of these facts.
A recent study found that Medicare for All would save around 68,000 lives a year—yes, having medical insurance saves lives—while reducing U.S. health care spending by about 13%, or $450 billion annually.
Universal medical care is a right long overdue.
