Pirate's Cove

Bernie Sanders is getting ready to submit legislation for a Medicare for all scheme, which has zero chance of even making it out of committee, much less a vote on the Senate and House floors (even with all the squishy Republicans in Congress, still zero). The NY Times gives him a platform to sorta describe his scheme

Bernie Sanders: Why We Need Medicare for All

This is a pivotal moment in American history. Do we, as a nation, join the rest of the industrialized world and guarantee comprehensive health care to every person as a human right? Or do we maintain a system that is enormously expensive, wasteful and bureaucratic, and is designed to maximize profits for big insurance companies, the pharmaceutical industry, Wall Street and medical equipment suppliers?

I had no idea that that was what Obamacare created. Thanks for the 411, Comrade Bernie!

We remain the only major country on earth that allows chief executives and stockholders in the health care industry to get incredibly rich, while tens of millions of people suffer because they can’t get the health care they need. This is not what the United States should be about.

Good news: a Medicare for all scheme would mean tens of millions would see their health care rationed, along with medical practices refusing to take it. Anyway, Bernie continues the typical gripes about Big Pharma and Big Insurance and such making money (how did Bernie afford a $600,000 summer home on a Senator’s salary?) before getting to

The solution to this crisis is not hard to understand. A half-century ago, the United States established Medicare. Guaranteeing comprehensive health benefits to Americans over 65 has proved to be enormously successful, cost-effective and popular. Now is the time to expand and improve Medicare to cover all Americans.

On Wednesday I will introduce the Medicare for All Act in the Senate with 15 co-sponsors and support from dozens of grass-roots organizations. Under this legislation, every family in America would receive comprehensive coverage, and middle-class families would save thousands of dollars a year by eliminating their private insurance costs as we move to a publicly funded program.

The transition to the Medicare for All program would take place over four years. In the first year, benefits to older people would be expanded to include dental care, vision coverage and hearing aids, and the eligibility age for Medicare would be lowered to 55. All children under the age of 18 would also be covered. In the second year, the eligibility age would be lowered to 45 and in the third year to 35. By the fourth year, every man, woman and child in the country would be covered by Medicare for All.

You know what he forgot? How to pay for this. California learned that this type of scheme would cost $400 billion, double what the overall budget of the state is. Even taking all the money people and companies already spend on insurance and such, and shifting the money from the federal government for Medicaid into the pool, there would still be a massive shortfall. Tiny Vermont couldn’t figure out a way to make it work. How will Bernie?

It will be interesting to see what the funding mechanisms will be when he releases the bill.