Yesterday, I wrote a short post about how candidates could talk about Medicare for All on the stump.
I’ll repeat some of what I wrote:
So how to counter these healthcare accusations on the stump and take back Home Field Advantage?
My thoughts:
Pivot to Government Subsidizing Private Companies. Immediately turn the “socialist” accusation around to how for-profit insurers privatize profits and socialize costs. Something along the lines of “You know who is benefitting from the very socialism they scream about? Medicare Advantage corporate insurers who are paid by the government because they couldn’t make money insuring our parents and grandparents otherwise. You know who else cashes in? Private corporate employers and their CEOs who get a tax break for providing insurance to their employees.”
Point Out the Insanity of People Having to Literally Predict Their Future Health When Choosing Insurance (see my post: Choice. It's What's for Dinner). Something along the lines of, “You know what’s really crazy? People having to literally guess what their (and their family’s) health will be in the future so they can choose the proper coverage. Will someone in my family get sick or injured next year? What drugs will I need next year? Will I be somewhere “out of network” when I need healthcare next year? You know who doesn’t have to make these ridiculous guesses and choices? Every resident of every other developed country in the world.”
Point Out That Medicare is More Efficient Than Private Insurance. How about this: “Did you know that administrative overhead for Medicare and Medicaid runs at about 2-4%, while private insurers suck up around 15-20% for overhead and profit? That’s billions of dollars being diverted to “middlemen” private corporations, shareholders and CEOs instead of going to improve you and your family’s health.”
Commenter Joe M. brought some additional points to my attention that I regularly spoke about on the campaign trail as a federal candidate and which I overlooked in my previous post. These points are important enough that I wanted to make sure they are included in my “stump suggestions”.
They are:
Point Out That We Force Businesses to Be Healthcare Managers. Push back with something along these lines: “Our current “system” forces every major corporation - and most small businesses - in the United States to be in two lines of work: first, whatever product(s) or service(s) are their core competency, and second, providing healthcare insurance and management for their employees. In a competitive global economy, this may be one of the most anti-competitive burdens that could be placed on American business in the private sector.”
Point Out That Employer-Provided Health Insurance is a Hidden Tax That is Baked into Everything We Sell in This Country. Use an example to illustrate this point. Perhaps something like this: “The cost of every automobile manufactured in the US has several thousand dollars of “healthcare” cost embedded in the price that other auto manufacturers in other countries don’t have. Again, this is absolutely anti-competitive in a global marketplace.”
The truth is there is no free lunch and money is fungible. Every other developed country manages to provide affordable universal healthcare for its people, paid for through taxes, at a significantly lower cost per person than our system here in the United States.
Moving to Medicare for All will likely require an increase in individual tax burdens. However, it should result in measurably lower costs: for medical goods and services including administrative overhead, profit, prescription drugs, hospital and physician care, as well as reduced health spending from having healthier people due to universal coverage; for almost every retail good and service; as well as higher wages/compensation for workers (due to reduced expense burdens on the businesses for which they work.
Candidates on the campaign trail should not be afraid of M4A. Those who favor such a system should vigorously and passionately inform the voters of the wide-ranging benefits - and reduced costs - of such a system. M4A is a life saver, it’s a money saver, and it makes our private sector more competitive. Win-win-win all the way around (except, to be fair, for shareholders, CEOs and, yes, some dislocation of workers in private insurance companies who may be able to find work elsewhere in the newly structured healthcare system).
The Doobie Brothers - The Doctor
