Medicare for all is the solution we are looking for

Paul Krugman’s letter to the editor in the July 11 Chronicle was largely correct and deserves to be thoughtfully contemplated. For those who seriously consider that 1/6 of our economy is consumed by health care, his metaphoric analysis of health care being a three-legged stool only stands if all three legs are intact is true. Krugman established other thoughts worth considering. He said, “Suppose you want to make health coverage available to everyone.......most health economists I know would love to see single payer Medicare for all.”  He followed with,” Realistically, however, that’s too heavy a lift for the time being.” He then said, “A switch to single-payer would require a large tax increase.” I immediately thought the next statement was the most important for people to realize, and that is, “Most people would gain more from the elimination of insurance premiums than they would lose from the tax hike. In context that means a single-payer-Medicare-for-all health insurance plan would save 95 percent of Americans more than the progressive modest taxes required to fund the program.

That’s the crux of understanding the cost effectiveness of Medicare for all as compared to the market-driven-for-profit-system we are under. There are four critical provisions of good health care that should be essential in any final version of a just system. It must be affordable to every American. It must include comprehensive benefits for every American regardless of gender, income, and age. It must guarantee unhindered access to care. It must be sustainable over time. The progressive taxation aspect of funding such a program must be understood by every person to be equitable, feasible, and cost-saving for individuals and families as compared to what we have.

If these criteria are met, everyone in the United States should be supportive of such a system. That system is H.R. 676, Medicare for all.