List of all current Medicare-for-all and Public Plan Proposals

[ehrnst]

Several bills have been introduced in the 116th Congress that would expand the role of public programs in health care. As more legislation is introduced, we will continue to update the side-by-side comparison tool. The bills range in scope from broad proposals to create a new national health insurance program for all residents to more incremental approaches that offer a public plan option in addition to current sources of coverage, private or public. These bills are grouped into five general categories:

Medicare-for-all, a single national health insurance program for all U.S. residents:

Medicare for All Act of 2019 by Rep. Jayapal, H.R. 1384
Medicare for All Act of 2019 by Sen. Sanders, S. 1129

A new national health insurance program for all U.S. residents with an opt out for qualified coverage:

Medicare for America Act of 2019 by Rep. DeLauro and Rep. Schakowsky, H.R. 2452

A new public plan option that would be offered to individuals through the ACA marketplace:

Keeping Health Insurance Affordable Act of 2019 by Sen. Cardin, S. 3
Choose Medicare Act by Sen. Merkley, S. 1261 and Rep. Richmond, H.R. 2463
Medicare-X Choice Act of 2019 by Sen. Bennet and Sen. Kaine, S. 981 and Rep. Delgado, H.R. 2000
The CHOICE Act by Rep. Schakowsky, H.R. 2085 and Sen. Whitehouse, S. 1033

A Medicare buy-in option for older individuals not yet eligible for the current Medicare program:

Medicare at 50 Act by Sen. Stabenow, S. 470
Medicare Buy-In and Health Care Stabilization Act of 2019 by Rep. Higgins, H.R. 1346

A Medicaid buy-in option that states can elect to offer to individuals through the ACA marketplace:

State Public Option Act by Sen. Schatz, S. 489 and Rep. Luján, H.R. 1277.

Interactive side-by-side comparison tool and downloadable pdf with a side-by-side comparison of all the proposals here:

https://www.kff.org/interactive/compare-medicare-for-all-public-plan-proposals/

[TreasonousBastard]

1. So, this is the list of "real" plans that are actually proposed in Congress...

Personally, since ACA is already there, I don't see any reason to upset everything and start from scratch.

Medicare itself was not difficult to pass because it filled a vacuum at the time. We have a different vacuum now, but it is much less easily defined.

Medicare, Medicaid, various children's programs, VA, private insurance, and whatever else is out there all work well within their own little spheres. The thing to do now is fill the holes and make them work better together.

[ehrnst]

3. Medicare was passed in part because LBJ was able to hide what it would cost.

That can't be done now with the CBO having the job of crunching the actual costs.

"Johnson maneuvered every step of the way getting this bill through Congress, and one of the things he did — and this is a little dicey in today's climate — was suppress the costs. So this young kid gets elected from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy, in 1962, and Johnson is explaining to him [over the phone] how you get a health bill through. And what he tells him is don't let them get the costs projected too far out because it will scare other people:

"A health program yesterday runs $300 million, but the fools had to go to projecting it down the road five or six years, and when you project it the first year, it runs $900 million. Now I don't know whether I would approve $900 million second year or not. I might approve 450 or 500. But the first thing Dick Russell comes running in saying, 'My God, you've got a billion-dollar program for next year on health, therefore I'm against any of it now.' Do you follow me?"

JM]: We believe, after looking at the evidence, my co-author [David Blumenthal] and I, that if the true cost of Medicare had been known "” if Johnson hadn’t basically hidden them "” the program would never have passed. America’s second-most beloved program would never have happened, if we had had genuine cost estimates.

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112234240

[Backseat Driver]

2. Thank you - this side-by-side comparison

seems very helpful in understanding what has, so far, been proposed for changes. Now we'll need the views of economists to specifically discuss the cost impacts in many important areas. Elizabeth Warren can do this! Many of our other primary candidates have the integrity to consult competent ones. Choose wisely!

If the elderly, the poor, and the disabled continue to be unable, on fixed incomes and even when augmented by what low-level employment they might acquire, move them into higher tax brackets or subject them to payroll deduction costs that eat up meager cash flow needed for budget items that also continue to rise outside of this arena, i.e., - housing, food costs, other insurance premiums and deductibles, state and local taxes at POS that chew away by nickels and dimes, the changes so proposed for healthcare coverage will have little impact on the quality of life and still promote a stigma of poverty with which they are already currently suffering.

What looks imperative is, at the top, electing a Democratic POTUS/VP and changing the numbers of the Senate, starting with Moscow Mitch, then likely GOP successors to his position, down to the newest of newbies who through leadership and lack of a desire to serve any save their own pocketbooks by abusing power and obstructing so much of our nation's desire to create a more perfect union. At such time, Democrats need to be ready in reversing the destruction and chaos that the current admin of miscreants and unqualified cabinet members, and shifty congress critters have inflicted on We the People and in support of our rule of law, intelligence agencies, allies.