Seelye quotes economist Skinner as claiming that Medicare expansion to cover every American would mean a tripling of the Medicare payroll tax—currently set at 2.9% of wages. But even if we accepted Skinner’s math, it is meaningless without looking at the savings side.
Sure expanding Medicare would mean higher Medicare taxes, but what about the following:
Medicaid, the program that pays for medical care for the poor, and is funded by federal and state taxes, would be eliminated, saving $400 billion a year.
Veterans’ care, currently running at $100 billion a year, would be eliminated.
Perhaps two-thirds of the $300 billion a year spent by federal, state and local governments to reimburse hospitals for so-called “charity care” for treatment of people who have no insurance but don’t qualify for Medicaid, would be eliminated.
Individuals and employers would no longer have to pay for private insurance.
Several hundred billion dollars currently spent on paperwork by private insurers would be eliminated.
Car insurance would be cheaper as there would no longer have to be coverage for medical bills.
Federal, state and local governments would no longer have to pay to insure public employees.
In short, if every person were on Medicare, the overall savings would overwhelm the small increase in the Medicare payroll tax of 5.8%.
The bottom line is that Canadians, who have Medicare for all, devote 10% of GDP to health care. Americans, who have private-insurance-based health care except for the elderly, devote 17% of GDP to health care.
Seelye and the Times have never mentioned any of this. Neither does President Obama or the Democratic Congress.
Dave Lindorff
