Republican Failures On Health Care Raise Calls For Single-Payer Health Plan

The failure of  the Republican attempt to repeal Obamacare is a tremendous defeat for Donald Trump, along with Paul Ryan, which may hinder their ability to pass other parts of the Republican agenda, such as rewriting the tax code. The inability of Republicans to come up with a reasonable solution for our health care problems highlights the inability to solve the problem by relying on the market, and has revived calls for a single-payer health care plan.

The Week has this argument for Why Democrats should push ‘Medicare for all’ now even before it the Republicans gave up on their plan:

The AHCA is a monstrous bill that would leave at least 24 million more people uninsured by 2026. But whether or not it fails, the Democrats shouldn’t sit idly by and wait for Republicans to slowly bleed ObamaCare to death by other means. They need a counter-offer, one that’s more compelling than the creaky status quo. They need a single-payer, Medicare for all plan. Here’s why.

The first reason is that single-payer is quite clearly the best universal health-care policy option for the United States. As Dr. Adam Gaffney explains, the U.S. model of multi-tiered health insurance has generally lousy and highly unequal outcomes, both here and in European countries with similar structures like the Netherlands. Complicated public-private hybrid systems mean much larger administrative costs, and the fact that markets are extraordinarily ill-suited to deliver health care means tons of difficult regulation.

Indeed, the distance in uninsured people between ObamaCare and single-payer is actually greater than that between ObamaCare and the Republican plan. Complicated, janky programs tend to let people fall through the cracks.

..The AHCA is extraordinarily unpopular because it takes coverage and subsidies away from people, and a majority believe that it should be the government’s responsibility to make sure everyone is covered. Fundamentally, Medicare is very popular, a fact only partially covered up by generations of red-baiting and duplicitous austerian propaganda. If Democrats had simply bulled ahead with a single payer-esque plan in 2009, instead of the complicated and heavily means-tested ObamaCare, they almost certainly would have done better than they actually did in the 2010 election.

And even for people who are skeptical of going full-bore all at once on single-payer, it still makes an excellent opening bid. Start with single-payer for all during the next bite at the health-care apple, and you could end up with a plan of combining Medicare and Medicaid, enrolling all people under 26 and over 55, and putting a Medicare buy-in on the ObamaCare exchanges. (That might begin chipping away at the employer-based system and be a somewhat more gradual route to single-payer.) Just witness the original opening bid for ObamaCare, which was far more generous before it got badly whittled down by conservative Democrats…

It also makes an excellent organizing signpost. Medicare for all is simple, easy to understand, and hard to argue against or distort. Most people know someone on Medicare who can testify to the generally good care, or who is counting the days until they can enroll and have the peace of mind that comes with quality coverage. Fabricated agitprop like the mythical ObamaCare “death panels” will be a much harder sell.

Erica Etelson is one of those writing op-eds promoting a single-payer plan, and taking the Democratic Party to task for failing to do so:

With Trumpcare dead on arrival in Congress, Democrats have an opening to propose what they should have pushed for in the first place: single-payer health care for all. Fifty-eight percent of Americans, including 41 percent of Republicans, favor a federally funded health care system that provides universal coverage. Only 48 percent want to keep Obamacare as is.

Though Democrats are loathe to admit it, Obamacare is far from perfect. Some people pay higher premiums and out-of-pocket costs than they can afford. In some areas of the country, choices of doctors are limited. Compared to nations with single-payer systems, health outcomes are poor. And a small but vocal minority of Americans are troubled by Obamacare’s individual mandate which, they believe, infringes on their liberty…

Bernie Sanders ran with remarkable success on a Medicare for All proposal that generated enormous excitement among the progressive wing of the party and sent shivers down the spine of the Democratic corporate establishment. Hillary Clinton, a one-time champion of single-payer, pounced on Sanders with alarmist, counterfactual claims that Sanders’ proposal would increase costs and make people worse off.

While the GOP is still cringing over the humiliating defeat of its seven-year promise to repeal Obamacare, Democrats should kick them while they’re down by introducing single-payer legislation. Even Trump-collaborator, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-WV, is starting to wise up, thanks to his constituents; at a recent town meeting, Manchin praised Canada’s health care system and said he was taking a look at single-payer as an alternative to Obamacare…

We watched the Democratic National Committee undercut Sanders’ candidacy. And we’ve watched the Democrats disappear the single-payer option by refusing to support Rep. John Conyers’, D-MI, single-payer bill (HR 676). Enough.

The Democrats’ lackluster opposition to Trumpism does not match the fierce and relentless resistance of their base. They can and must stop doubling down on the centrist “pragmatism” that has alienated growing numbers of voters and start acting like a party more committed to the health and well-being of the 99 percent than protecting the power and profits of oligarchs.

This populist moment in American politics is the Democrats’ to seize. With a strong majority supporting single payer, the Democrat have a golden opportunity to give their dwindling base a reason to come home. As Trump said moments after conceding defeat, “Here’s the good news: Health care is now totally the property of the Democrats.” Good news indeed, if the Democrats know what to make of it.

Donald Trump now has the opportunity to work with Democrats, and any Republicans who are willing, to fulfill his campaign promises of giving us a great health care plan which will cover everybody. Of course he will not do so, and will probably continue to work to undermine the Affordable Care Act.