A Quick Look at ‘Medicare For All’ a.k.a. M4A

There are reams and reams of words written about why Bernie Sanders's proposal of Medicare For All—abbreviated as M4A—is going to be prohibitively expensive.  The information that follows is taken from here: Thanks to the Koch Brothers, We Have More Proof that Single Payer Saves Money and Cares for All of Us, an article dated July 31, 2018, taken from The Nation. I must go back and read more carefully, but the gist of this article is as follows.

Paul Ryan, who was then Speaker of the House, supposedly read a report commissioned by the Koch Brothers, from a think-tank at George Mason University, which Ryan and other conservatives cheered as supporting their hostility to universal health care.  Paul Ryan reported that the cost for expanding Medicare to everyone would be $32.6 Trillion over ten years.  (Why do they always report it that way?  I assume it means $3.26 Trillion a year.  Jeeze.)  Their point was that even doubling everyone's taxes wouldn't pay for it.

But, the report says,

... under the Sanders plan “national personal health care costs decrease by less than 2 percent, while total health expenditures decrease by only 4 percent, even after assuming substantial administrative cost savings.” 

Now, the big question is—and both the report and the analyses of it seem to think that this is obvious, but it isn't to me—is 2%, or 4%, or our present annual expenses, less than $3.26 a year?  If we spend presently, all of us, as a nation, more than $3.3 trillion a year on health care, then we may redirect that money into the Medicare For All plan, and still be up on the deal.  Rich folk who get super expensive health care presently, will contribute some of that health care money in taxes, the poor, who get no health care, or cheap health care will pay that money into the IRS, and still get more health care than they're getting at present, and whatever money is left over in the purses of the super rich can be spent for additional insurance, so that anyone who wants can get replacement knees every other year, or whatever.

But for this argument to work, we need to find out how much we pay presently, as a nation, for healthcare.  I Googled this question, and you can, too.  It turns out that, as a nation, and as individuals and corporations, we spend $3.5 trillion already.  Clearly, Bernie's plan will not cost more than we pay presently; it costs less. 

I'm not sure whether the Koch study deliberately tried to fool the public, or whether they were looking at different numbers, or whether they assumed that the new Medicare expenses would be in addition to their present expenses, or what.  Basically, our money (if we have insurance) goes to taxes, rather than to health insurance, and the Government insures us.  Those of us who support Medicare For All simply considers that this is one of the things the Government should be doing.

One of the comments at the bottom of the article hits the nail on the political head.

[L]et’s not lose sight of the fact that the fight for single payer is basically a class struggle. Americans want healthcare, but the 1% want to protect what they consider their right to profit from the current system.
Single payer is a social system which provides healthcare to everyone with the costs spread across the population; basically a non-profit system. Whereas, our current system is a market system which primarily provides a source of private profit and healthcare is secondary. [Boldface is mine.]
...
Lastly, many American corporations would be more competitive if freed from the excessive costs of providing healthcare insurance for their employees, because companies in Canada, Europe, and Japan pay much less.

This commenter also pointed out that Society is also about solidarity, about building solutions together.  But the present system in the US firstly about profiting from the sickness of the customers, and secondly about providing health services.

I want to add that, at least in some sorts of services, Medicare needs less annoying paperwork than ordinary insurance needs.  On the other hand, the profits health insurance companies get out of patients feeds, clothes, and houses, thousands of people across the country.

Note: according to Google, the Health Insurance Industry employs around 2.66 million people.  So the industry does provide a lot of employment to our friends.  If you have a friend employed in the Health Insurance Industry, your attitude towards Medicare For All might be different.  But bear in mind that the number of people employed by Medicare will increase somewhat; possibly by as many as 2.6 million, possibly by fewer.  Possibly by more, because private employers invariably try to get more work out of fewer people.

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