Ok, our health-care system is the worst and the most expensive in the world. But we suffer from multiple competing proposals to fix it. And each is complex facing numerous arguments against it, some legit, some not.
What we need is a simple proposal, one that everyone can easily understand. Here is my proposal. The entire bill is to remove three words from the Medicare legislation. We delete the following:
For all Americans
over age 65
That's it. The legislation to provide health care to all Americans is a bill to remove three words. (Note: I don't know if the above is the exact wording in the current law.)
Here's the beauty of this approach. Everyone will understand it. And Medicare is respected. Everyone who has parents over 65 knows that their system is much better than what they have. It immediately paints a very clear choice for everyone - stick with what you have or switch to Medicare.
This will sell. If this was a credible proposal in Washington it would almost certainly get strong active support from most Americans.
It would also be very hard for those fighting it. They can't claim that the proposed system is not understood - it's in use. They can't claim it's a poor alternative, seniors are very happy with it (aside from the prescription bill). It would be almost impossible to fight.
Now some people will say, "but my plan X is better." So what. For 40 years we have plans A, B, C through ZZZZZZZZ. You can't sell it. This can be sold. And it's far superior to what we have today.
And once we have everyone on Medicare, then you can propose your plan X as a way to improve Medicare. That would be an easier sell. Besides, if your plan X is so good, then it should be for everyone, not just for those under 65.
As to funding it, that also could be made very easy. It would be funded with a corporate tax, partially on employee pay above a set base and partially on corporate profits. The goal would be for the corporate tax payments to be comparable to the present health insurance that companies are paying - but for the total to be less. So corporations are looking at a reduction in expenses. This will get most of corporate America to, if not back it, at least not fight it.
And by funding the plan directly from corporate taxes, it places a tax on business that cannot be easily shifted to personal taxes. Like social security this tax would go direct to the Medicare trust fund and would not be placed in the general fund. So that keeps a direct tax source for medical care.
This is also good because the total taxes are tied to total expenses and therefore corporations will constantly exert pressure for the system to improve. That's a good thing as that pressure will cause our medical system to be more efficient and effective.
The payroll part of the tax (levied on the corporation, not the individual) should be the opposite of social security. No tax on any pay up to 150% of minimum wage and the tax cuts in after that. And it is levied against all compensation, salary, bonuses, stock, etc. with no upper limit. Because the CEO making 25 million a year needs lots of healthy employees to earn that income.
All so simple to sell. "Put everyone on Medicare, taxes less than the present business cost of health insurance."
For all of those presidential candidates in the Senate - imagine what would happen if you proposed this bill. You would own the issue of health insurance.
