Greg Walden leads charge, opposing "Government takeover of Health Care"

The Opposition to Medicare-for-All is setting up the frame.  Focus on what you risk losing, not what you gain.  

      

 "We know that this plan would take away private health insurance from more than 150 million Americans, end Medicare as we know it, and rack up more than $32 trillion in costs, not to mention delays in accessing health services."               

          Greg Walden, Ranking Republican, Energy and Commerce Committee

Yesterday this blog wrote about loss remorse. People don't want to lose what they have, even if what they have isn't all that good. That is the focus of Greg Walden's attack on Medicare-for-All. Loss.

Ralph, from southern Oregon, wrote me, "You are full of shit, Peter, on this one." Ralph said the current health insurance system was far from popular.

              

Ralph explains: "Only full time large corporation employees who are not contracted “servants", and public employees, love their health plans. Small business health plans offer  huge deductibles and large out of pocket expenses. Large corporation employees, working part time, get nothing." 

I know from experience that employer-sponsored health care has problems. It is a crushing cost for my former brokerage clients who ran small businesses. Employees who wanted to retire couldn't, lest they lose job-based insurance. Many people found private coverage utterly unaffordable. Employer-based health insurance doesn't address the growing gig economy of contract workers.

Yesterday's post reported a poll by the insurance industry saying that people liked the status quo. I believe the poll was actually measuring fear, not content with the status quo. People who have something to lose don't want to lose it. 

Poll: University of Michigan

This is especially so for people 50 to 64 years old. They have become expensive employees in their employers' risk pools.  People are in "job-lock," daring not to change jobs, worried that layoffs or mergers will end their employment, unable to take early retirement until the magic age of 65 when they become Medicare eligible. 

Everyone I know who is 65 or older gets Medicare and is pretty happy with it. Health care providers know what to do. You show them your card, they scan it, and from then on all billing takes place in the back offices of the provider, Medicare, and the supplemental insurance company you signed up with. 

Supporters of Medicare-for-All risk misunderstanding seniors. One could assume that people happy with the program want it extended to everyone. Not necessarily. Seniors, too, have fears. They fear that the current system that works for them will be ruined by overloading the system. No room in the lifeboat.

Greg Walden is appealing to that fear. Lose private health insurance, lose Medicare, high taxes, lousy service.

Walden elaborates:

"The American people need to fully understand how Medicare for All is not Medicare at all, but actually just government-run, single-payer health care. They need to know about the $32 trillion price tag for such a plan, and the tax increases necessary to pay for it. They need to know it ends employer sponsored health care, forcing the 158 million Americans who get their health care through their job or union into a one-size-fits-all government-run plan. If you like waiting in line at the DMV, wait until the government completely takes over health care."


There are ironies here. Walden says to fear that your Medicare will be taken away, and replaced--horror of horrors--by a dreaded government-run single-payer health care program--which is, of course, a description of Medicare. 

It is laughable, but politically viable. Medicare is now so integrated into the expectations of seniors it seems like a "given,"--like air--not a program. I saw no signs attacking Medicare or Social Security at the libertarian conference I attended last weekend.

Walden cites the cost of the Medicare-for-All program, but not the cost of the current system, with its patchwork of private plans, tax deductions, and insurance company transaction costs, plus the cost to providers with their own overhead of billing clerks to negotiate the current tangle. 

Here is the point to realize: Walden is not doing a comparison. He is attacking. He is not praising the status quo, he is telling people that changing it will risk loss. Say no. Bunker down.

Progressives need to show that the status quo is the threat, and expanded health care access is a safe choice. It will make it harder to make a bold step. People age 50 and older are the reliable voters, the health care issue is personal to them, and most of the voters have something to lose.

Progressives need to understand the political realities.