Slate: Kamala Harris' Health Care Plan Is to Make "Medicare for All" Look Cheap

[highplainsdem]

This is from Jordan Weissman, who writes the Moneybox column (https://slate.com/business/moneybox) for Slate:


https://slate.com/business/2019/07/kamala-harris-health-care-medicare-private-insurance.html

Harris’ plan starts to get murky, however, when it comes to the question of how she’d pay for the thing. Sanders has proposed several ways to finance his plan, though it’s not clear they would actually come close to covering the whole cost. Two key pieces are a 7.5 percent payroll tax on employers and a 4 percent “income-based premium” on most households. Sanders is not hiding this: He has argued clearly that while many businesses and households would pay more in taxes, they’d come out ahead by saving on insurance premiums.

Harris doesn’t try to make that argument. She says that Sanders has put forward “good options” for financing his plan but that a 4 percent premium “hits the middle class too hard,” and proposes “that we exempt households making below $100,000, along with a higher income threshold for middle-class families living in high-cost areas.” Harris wants to make up the difference by putting in place a $2 trillion financial transactions tax that would hit stock and bond trades. In short, she’s promising the middle class something for basically nothing.

It’s possible that Harris’ team has run these numbers and they pencil out. But from what they’ve released, it appears they are relying on some accounting gimmicks to make the math work. (I asked the Harris campaign for some additional information on their plan, but it didn’t respond.) Congress usually calculates the cost of federal programs based on a 10-year budget window, so you can hide expenses by backloading outside of that time frame. I’m guessing that’s the point of Harris’ decadelong transition to “Medicare for All.” “By extending the phase-in period to ten years, we will decrease the overall cost of the program compared to the Sanders proposal,” her proposal states. And that’s true—for the first 10 years.

It’s kind of refreshing to see a presidential campaign implicitly admit that it’s just playing with numbers that only a few budget nerds will care about. And there’s obviously some lol-nothing-matters political logic to it; the chances of Congress ever passing something as ambitious as full-on “Medicare for All,” or even a modified version like what Harris is pitching, are slim. So what’s the point of committing yourself to the unpopular tax hikes that are probably necessary to make such a bill a reality? Impressing policy reporters doesn’t get you that far in the Iowa caucuses, after all.

But it also feels, fundamentally, a little cynical, like a plan that’s designed not to be implemented. Harris isn’t willing to spend political capital arguing for the sort of tradeoffs most people think will be necessary for to make “Medicare for All” a reality. And with a 10-year time frame, there’s a decent chance Harris would have to rely on a Republican successor to carry out her vision faithfully, which seems unlikely. Harris has clarified her stance on health care. But you have to wonder how committed she really is to it.

[Andy823]

1. And yet I read this

Kathleen Sebelius, former HHS Secretary, said of @KamalaHarris plan “This plan builds on the progress we made in the ACA and expands upon its promise of universal coverage through a sensible expansion of the popular Medicare system.

Sorry, but I think I will take her word for it, she has more knowledge of the issue.

[highplainsdem]

2. As with all our candidates' health care plans, there's both criticism and praise.

[Andy823]

4. Yes there is

and I think all of the plans need to be checked out, by say someone who actually understands them, and knows what will work the "best" for the people, don't you? That's why I posted what what I did from someone who has experience with the ACA.

[ucrdem]

3. "a little cynical, like a plan that's designed not to be implemented."

A lot of that going around lately on the senate side.

[Andy823]

5. That's kind of funny

"not be implemented". Did you read what I posted above?

Kathleen Sebelius, former HHS Secretary, said of @KamalaHarris plan “This plan builds on the progress we made in the ACA and expands upon its promise of universal coverage through a sensible expansion of the popular Medicare system.

So do you really think that Sebelius would say this if she didn't think it could be implemented?