Today in America, we have more than 27 million people without any health insurance. Millions more who have employer-based insurance are being fleeced by skyrocketing premiums and prescription drug prices, and they are often thrown off those private plans when they change or lose jobs.
This is great for the 64 health care CEOs who were paid $1.7 billion in 2017. But this is an economic and medical emergency for millions of Americans. The good news is that we have a very straightforward solution that draws from our own country’s past success: We can guarantee health care as a right to all by expanding Medicare, the most popular and successful program in American history.
Medicare is the country’s most popular and cost-effective health care program. Americans who are covered by Medicare report significantly higher satisfaction ratesthan those with private insurance. That is not surprising: Unlike private insurance, Medicare does not threaten to bankrupt people in order to enrich greedy CEOs. Instead, it guarantees coverage.
Now here’s more good news: By expanding that coverage to everyone, we will save Americans money. Under a Medicare for All system, we will no longer be paying those exorbitant CEO compensation packages, or the absurdly high administrative costs in the private insurance system. We will also be able to negotiate lower drug prices.
OUR VIEW: ‘Medicare for All’ is a political pipe dream
Back when America was considering the original Medicare, opponents said it was “un-American” and an attack on basic freedom. In retrospect, those arguments against guaranteeing health care to fellow Americans seem ridiculous and monstrous — but they are the same kind of arguments that are made against Medicare for All, and we should reject them.
Those who want to preserve pharmaceutical and insurance profits expect us to believe that doing what every other industrialized nation has already done is too radical. Lobbyists and front groups for those industries are going to spend a lot of money on deceptive ads trying to scare Americans. But I believe we are finally on the verge of defeating these forces of the status quo.
Just as America did in the lead up to the passage of Medicare, we are building a national movement for Medicare for All. Polls now show that a majority of Americans support the idea. That is because of our grassroots organizing work, but also because of the crushing reality more and more Americans face.
No 30-second television ad from a dark money group will convince a person that the huge health care bill they are looking at from their insurance company is acceptable. No radio ad from a corporate lobbying group will convince a person that their inability to pay exorbitant prices for medicines is acceptable.
To be sure, as we gain momentum, the health care industry will shift tactics and try to persuade us to accept incremental changes. But the health care crisis is so intense, we must not accept any substitute. Medicare is a successful model for American health care; we can, we must and we will expand it to cover everyone.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., is seeking the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.