Submitted by Corbulo2526 t3_zulbez in space
pugofthewildfrontier t1_j1m2qc0 wrote
Reply to comment by sporksable in Congress adds $1.7 billion for U.S. Space Force in 2023 spending bill by Corbulo2526
Gonna need to see your estimate that shows universal health care (not public option) would cost 8-9 trillion per year, since we’re already above 4 trillion per year.
A recent study by Yale epidemiologists found that Medicare for All would save around 68,000 lives a year while reducing U.S. health care spending by around 13%, or $450 billion a year.
Medicare for All spending would be approximately $37.8 trillion between 2017 and 2026, according to a study by the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. That amounts to about $5 trillion in savings over that time. These savings would come from reducing administrative costs and allowing the government to negotiate prescription drug prices.
Other studies by think tanks and government agencies have analyzed single-payer proposals at the state and federal levels. Most found Medicare for All would reduce our total health care spending.
Even a study by the Koch-funded Mercatus Center found that Medicare for All would save around $2 trillion over a 10-year period.
sporksable t1_j1mb4ft wrote
I was wrong, it was about 1.5 Trillion/yr over present spending, an average of 3 Trillion a year (we spend about 1.5 trillion already to cover around half of residents, so that jives fairly well). Which is substantially less than 4 trillion/yr.
The fact remains, though, that DoD budgets, even with the bloated one we have right now, doesn't begin to cover the expenses accrued under the M4A proposals. And that also does not take into account the fact that purely medicare (without medicaid, CHIPS, Tricare, IHS etc) is responsible for more than half of the deficit we have right now (with social security making up the rest). FedGov runs a surplus without these mandatory programs.
But that is getting in the weeds a little bit. Point is, the entire DoD budget doesn't begin to cover M4A. There would need to be substantially more offset.
Oh, and the Mercatus Center study is a really poor one to use, since the author himself states that cost savings are unrealistic. It pretty much assumes that providers will take a 40% cut to reimbursement rates with no knock-on effects.
To be clear here, I'm not saying that M4A or universal healthcare is a bad thing. But I am saying that "stop buying bullets, buy bandages" isn't a realistic way to look at healthcare policy, or paying for universal care.
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