New study: Medicare for All Act would cost $32 trillion+ over next ten years

What they don't tell you is the alternative will be trillions more expensive. Medicare for all will actually be cheaper for the country.

U.S. health care spending grew 4.3 percent in 2016, reaching $3.3 trillion or $10,348 per person. As a share of the nation's Gross Domestic Product, health spending accounted for 17.9 percent.

https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statis...endData/NationalHealthAccountsHistorical.html

 

When we people learn that we already subsidize healthcare for just about everyone in this country? We spend a crap load at the government level (Medicare, Medicaid, Tricare, VA, non-military employee insurance, indigent care) and at the insurance level (my $20K+ policy that doesn't cover a damn thing beside my kids' shots and my wife's annual gyno visit, and that is only because of Obamacare).

 

Federal budget strain is reserved for the tax cuts for the rich not for normal people.

 

So roughly ten grand a year per citizen. Seems a bit high especially if you have kids.

 

The cost goes on to the federal government, but comes off of household budgets. Sounds alright.

I'm a little immune to the cost arguments after the GOP tax cuts. They tell me Democrats spend with abandon, they've demonstrated they spend with abandon, I'm going to be the little dutch boy with my finger in the dike? Please take a different angle. Maybe death panels. Those played well.

 

Its already 10,345/year. The problem is doctors and drug companies can charge whatever they want. It doesn't follow normal economic models. With things like balance billing and opacity of medical billing you can't really even tell what you are paying and what your insurance covers.

 

But we could build so many many many great walls with that money. Seawalls, underwater walls, walls over canada, walls over Hawaii, walls over puersho rico. Keep them all out!
how many walls? around 380 beautiful walls.

 

Wall off chronically ill people and old people. Easy solution as they are the ones responsible. If we wall them off, the amount the Federal government spends on healthcare now would be more than enough to cover 100% of the costs of everyone left.

 

It's weird that the rest of the world can do it but the richest country in the world can't.

 

This is a useful discussion and yes, all the numbers are alarming. So for comparison (as per @krnxsnoopy above), here is some CBO estimating from 2014. This is when Obamacare was really starting to work a bit, but now (and you all can debate the reasons, either b/c of 45's sabotage or its inherent flaws or both), we're pretty much back on the blue curve or worse.



So a single payer system accounts for 2-3% more of the federal budget, according to this analysis, than business as usual. Though at current rates of increase (higher than this 2014 estimate), I would bet they're more similar.

Single payer would just cut out a lot of household bankruptcies that are ongoing due to health emergencies. Hard to incorporate the effect of healthcare spending on household budgets in a plot of federal budget effects.

 

What they don't tell you is the alternative will be trillions more expensive. Medicare for all will actually be cheaper for the country.

What is this "collectivist" bullsiht about "country"; only libertarian "individualism" counts. If others do not have health care too bad for them.

Generally the brainwashed folks waiting patiently for decades for tax cuts for billionaires to trickle down are the same folks who can spend $10.000 per year on family health insurance ( or in many cases rack up $10,000 in unpaid medical bills) then think they are better off than if they had to pay $5000 more in taxes to fund National Healthcare without the $10,000 insurance and co-pays..

Also OMG if they had to wait a few days for elective surgery. Clearly it is better if necessary to have those desperately needing non-elective surgery to go without or to wait in lines sometimes years long. E.g hernia repairs, knee replacements etc-- just a little heads up for the comfortably unaware.

Also the same folks are proud to proclaim that we are the greatest and richest and best country but too poor to afford what other developed countries have. Tough, to figure out. I know.

 

Agreed this isn’t expensive when you look at the big picture.

I think Medicare is a joke when your poor lifestyle choices that add up over throughout your life are then generously subsidized. I realize old age is expensive healthcare wise, but obesity is a choice.

 

Well.... first I would point out that nice little tax cut that Trump decided to champion will cost the USA between 5-7 trillion dollars over the next decade.
So that alone would be 20% of the healthcare cost for the entire USA.

The last I looked the USA government took in over 2 trillion dollars a year in revenue.

If we assume that the numbers as estimated are right, the cost for full medical for everyone in the USA would be about 320 billion dollars a year.

The USA government on mandatory expenditures already spends 980 billion dollars a year on medicare & health.

We also spend over 600 billion a year on the military.

The cost of insurance right now, in many cases is paid for by the employer and the employee with high premiums.

Just looking at the raw numbers, and the tax break costs........ it really isn't that far fetched at all to implement if you believe the 320 billion dollars a year is accurate. It would require an increase in taxes but not to the degree of what the cost is through employment coverage.

Hell, we spend 600 billion dollars a year on the military, and another 160 billion on veteran benefits.

 

The richest country would rather spend close to a trillion dollars a year on the military and related costs.

Our tax revenue is twice that of the second largest in the entire world.

It all comes down to priorities.

 

What is cost per household for unauthorized immigrants in this plan?

 

So 3.2 trillion dollars a year or roughly right about what the government took in taxes last year (though they spent 4.1 trillion). I'm sure the people won't mind literally doubling their taxes in order to get crap quality healthcare with long waiting lines "for free" I'm sure literally doubling taxes won't have any negative effects on the economy.

 

Still $0 as always....but they'll be able to receive full benefits I'm sure.

 

So open borders and free healthcare?

Sounds like a win/win to me.

 

Tide is turning. Medicare for all is coming. We did it, CF!