Election 2020

[nots]

What do you consider the middle class?

I shouldn’t have said middle class...I should have said ‘raise taxes on everyone would be a start’.
Just for perspective, the federal government took in 3.3 T last year in individual and corporate taxes, which as we know was $1T short of expenses. MFA is expected to cost 3.2T per year according to the Urban Institute*.
* you can find other organizations where the number is anywhere for 2.8 to 3.6 T.
I am looking forward to seeing how Sen Warren gets the numbers to balance.

To specifically answer your question:

https://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0912/which-income-class-are-you.aspx

[revo]

Mayor Pete surges into 3rd in the latest Iowa Caucus poll, at the expense of Bernie, Harris and Beto, who sinks to a goose egg:

Iowa Democratic Presidential Caucus	Emerson	Warren 23, Biden 23, Sanders 13, [B]Buttigieg 16[/B], Harris 2, Booker 3, Yang 5, Steyer 2, Klobuchar 1, Bullock 4, Gabbard 2, O'Rourke 0, Bennet 1	Tie

[Sour Masher]

Mayor Pete surges into 3rd in the latest Iowa Caucus poll, at the expense of Bernie, Harris and Beto, who sinks to a goose egg:

Iowa Democratic Presidential Caucus	Emerson	Warren 23, Biden 23, Sanders 13, [B]Buttigieg 16[/B], Harris 2, Booker 3, Yang 5, Steyer 2, Klobuchar 1, Bullock 4, Gabbard 2, O'Rourke 0, Bennet 1	Tie

I had a feeling a move from a moderate was coming, and I thought it would be Mayor Pete. But I was wrong about who he would displace. I figured his uptick would coincide with down numbers for Biden. I still have doubts that he could go the distance based on his age, inexperience in national politics, and, sexual preference (I'd hope we are over the latter, and I know younger people are, but older voters and minority voters, not sure they are).

[GwynnInTheHall]

I shouldn’t have said middle class...I should have said ‘raise taxes on everyone would be a start’.
Just for perspective, the federal government took in 3.3 T last year in individual and corporate taxes, which as we know was $1T short of expenses. MFA is expected to cost 3.2T per year according to the Urban Institute*.
* you can find other organizations where the number is anywhere for 2.8 to 3.6 T.
I am looking forward to seeing how Sen Warren gets the numbers to balance.

To specifically answer your question:
https://www.investopedia.com/financi...s-are-you.aspx

Does she only have to balance it within a Trillion deficit?

[Sour Masher]

I shouldn’t have said middle class...I should have said ‘raise taxes on everyone would be a start’.
Just for perspective, the federal government took in 3.3 T last year in individual and corporate taxes, which as we know was $1T short of expenses. MFA is expected to cost 3.2T per year according to the Urban Institute*.
* you can find other organizations where the number is anywhere for 2.8 to 3.6 T.
I am looking forward to seeing how Sen Warren gets the numbers to balance.

To specifically answer your question:
https://www.investopedia.com/financi...s-are-you.aspx

Are those cost estimates in addition to current medicare costs? Also, how much does private insurance cost employees and employers now, on average? A fair comparison would compare only the additonal cost of Med4All above our current medicare and medicaid plans and take into account current costs for insurance. Also, some states already provide additional coverage for children and the poor. Florida, for instance, does that. In such states, looking at how much funding a federal program would free up would be good too.

[Sour Masher]

Trump has crazy amounts of money for his campaign already. Record setting--twice as much cash on hand right now than Obama had for his relection bid at this point, and the figure is growing. We see in baseball that the team that spends the most doesn't always win, but it is concerning how much money Trump's side has to play with: https://www.politico.com/news/2019/1...lection-050962

[nots]

Does she only have to balance it within a Trillion deficit?

I don’t think it’s going to matter, but sure, that would be fine.

[nots]

Trump has crazy amounts of money for his campaign already. Record setting--twice as much cash on hand right now than Obama had for his relection bid at this point, and the figure is growing. We see in baseball that the team that spends the most doesn't always win, but it is concerning how much money Trump's side has to play with: https://www.politico.com/news/2019/1...lection-050962

All the money in the world didn’t help Hillary last time. I don’t think it’s going to turn the tide for Trump either.

[nots]

Are those cost estimates in addition to current medicare costs? Also, how much does private insurance cost employees and employers now, on average? A fair comparison would compare only the additonal cost of Med4All above our current medicare and medicaid plans and take into account current costs for insurance. Also, some states already provide additional coverage for children and the poor. Florida, for instance, does that. In such states, looking at how much funding a federal program would free up would be good too.

The article DMT posted uses 3.4T instead of the 3.2T I used, but yes those are additional costs.
Here it is again:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/10/high-cost-warren-and-sanderss-single-payer-plan/600166/

Note the part where Warren’s wealth tax is going to only generate 2.75T over the next decade ($275B/year).

[Sour Masher]

The article DMT posted uses 3.4T instead of the 3.2T I used, but yes those are additional costs.
Here it is again:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/10/high-cost-warren-and-sanderss-single-payer-plan/600166/

Note the part where Warren’s wealth tax is going to only generate 2.75T over the next decade ($275B/year).

I don't see how she could propose a plan that generates enough revenue to get it done without doing what is never politically viable--raising taxes of the middle class. It won't matter if she tries to explain that they will save money by not paying for insurance or getting offsetting raises, like Bernie has. It just won't work. A substantial tax increase on the majority of Americans will never pass. I'd love to hear the plan B--what less expensive option will she try to get done that adds coverage for the greatest number of un-covered Americans, but that is probably not politically wise for her to get into now as she fends off Bernie on the left. Heck, I'd love to hear the same plan from Bernie, but that won't happen. Neither wants to give ground to the other on hardline support for Med4All.

[Kevin Seitzer]

Maybe I don't understand enough about Medicare for All, but why would it be so much more expensive for the United States to implement a single-payer health care system, as opposed to other Western developed countries?

I can see in other areas, for example, high-speed train networks and mass transit, why what works in Europe doesn't work in the U.S., because our country is more spread out and many of our big cities are more sprawling, having been based around the automobile rather than the horse and the ox-cart. But I don't particularly see why health care should be vastly different between the U.S. and Europe.

If insurance companies and big pharma have to keep their huge cuts that they are currently taking from the system, then sure, we will be much more expensive, but isn't the point of going to single-payer to get rid of all that unproductive overhead?

[Sour Masher]

Maybe I don't understand enough about Medicare for All, but why would it be so much more expensive for the United States to implement a single-payer health care system, as opposed to other Western developed countries?

I can see in other areas, for example, high-speed train networks and mass transit, why what works in Europe doesn't work in the U.S., because our country is more spread out and many of our big cities are more sprawling, having been based around the automobile rather than the horse and the ox-cart. But I don't particularly see why health care should be vastly different between the U.S. and Europe.

If insurance companies and big pharma have to keep their huge cuts that they are currently taking from the system, then sure, we will be much more expensive, but isn't the point of going to single-payer to get rid of all that unproductive overhead?

I've long been perplexed by this as well. Logically, if you keep payments for services and drugs the same (and they should actually go down) and cut out the middle man that is the insurance industry, and the many billions in profits they make, the net cost for Med4All should be less. Yes, it would cost jobs, even if we have a system allowing for supplemental insurance like our current medicare does, but the cost should go down.

What I assume that means is that while taxes would go up to pay for health care, on the whole, health care will cost less for Americans, but the key there is that if you are comparing coverage for all vs coverage for all, and we do not have that right now. That health care that was once unavailable will become available to millions who did not have it, so that extra coverage makes the overall cost higher than before. So, both sides are right. It will cost more, but it is also the cheapest way to get coverage for everyone. I assume is we hypothetically bought health insurance for every uninsured American through private insurance carriers, the added cost would exceed 3.2T a year. In short, the difference in cost is the difference between millions uninsured vs everyone insured, minus the cost savings we get by going to a single payer system.

[revo]

Nancy Pelosi's favorability percentage is 44%, the highest in a decade, according to a new CNN poll.

[Ken]

I assume is we hypothetically bought health insurance for every uninsured American through private insurance carriers, the added cost would exceed 3.2T a year.

I don't think that is correct. Looking at various sources and assuming worst case, it looks like there are ~50 million uninsured. If we assume the added costs for insuring those individuals exceeds 3.2T, that equates to $64,000 a year for insurance. Average insurance premiums are less than $500 per month for an individual, or $6K annually. So we would be an entire factor of 10 off here.

[Teenwolf]

The same study that cites a $34 Tn cost for Medicare for All also projects a $50 Tn cost for the current system. Bernie says so at the beginning of this clip. "If we do nothing about health care, I believe the estimate is that we would pay $50 Tn" is his quote.

Every study is different. The previous study from the Koch brothers think tank Mercatus had found Medicare for All would cost $32 Tn, but estimated the system as is would cost $34 Tn. I don't believe that any of the studies analyzing cost have show a higher projected cost than the current disastrous system. But that's never mentioned.