Just read Bernie's "Medicare For All" plan that he'll be introducing this week.
I like Bernie in general, but I have to remember that he's a politician, so I'm not surprised that he's lying about the plan to make it more palatable for the masses. I guess he figures he can get away with being dishonest because most people don't actually know how Medicare works.
His plan is NOT just "Medicare for All". Medicare has deductibles and only covers 80% of expenses. That's where dynamic free market competition comes in, to fill those gaps (and more, in many cases) to different degrees depending on the consumer's choice. His plan appears to be 100% single payer, period. "Free" health care.
How would he pay for it? An across-the-board 6.2% tax on employers at a time when global business competition is becoming more intense by the hour. A new 2.2% tax on all Americans and higher taxes on the wealthy. Then we'd see, maybe a few additions here and there.
If you're a health care provider on any level, you will have one contract, with the government. It will tell you what you will be allowed to make. And, since no tort reform is in the plan, you'll need to keep that battery of unneeded defensive medicine measures in place so that you're not sued.
Expanding the current Medicare / Medicare Supplement / Medicare Advantage system to all would be much better, but that's not where Bernie's head is. He'd rather be dishonest with the name of this thing to make it more attractive. Standard politician behavior. Oh well. Even Bernie is susceptible to it.
Maybe the plan would look more like what I want than his plan by the time it made it through the process. Here's hoping.
Medicare for All: Leaving No One Behind
Here's how Medicare ACTUALLY works, in less than three minutes:
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Don't most people get their insurance from employers now? Something like 80-85% get it from their employer, where the employee pays their share and the coverage may only be for 70% and the employee has to pay 30% or if they are lucky and pay an arm and a leg in premiums for the copay of 20%?
If the tax for this Medicare for All, comes to less than what the employer is funding now for his employees and less than what the employees pay now, it's a win win....even if we have to pay the 20% out of pocket....... we were already paying 20% to 30% to 40% if we had coverage from work equivalent of a Bronze plan..... and of course Medicare Advantage type plans would be created for those who use a lot of healthcare to cover those out of pocket amounts and for the very poor, like this old woman who used to live near Matt's mom that we knew, would get Medicaid on top of Medicare, to cover her out of pocket expenses....
Remember, the insurance companies are 25% to 30% of the cost that we pay for healthcare, and that is simply for pushing paper and not actual health care.....
there has got to be savings going to a Medicare for all, for both the Employer funding it now, and the employee funding their share now....
From what I have read...medicare's overhead costs are really really low too...
And can you imagine the savings in doctor's offices and Hospitals Billing departments....on NOT having to bill 100 different Insurance companies with 100 different negotiated prices?
Another perk for employees is that their Medicare for All coverage would be Nationwide...
vs. now, many insurance plans only cover in network which is commonly only within their State, and out of network costs the employee at least 50%...
There has got to be a way to do this, with SAVINGS for everyone, employer and employee and govt.
