Medicare for ALL

Medicare for All is a proposed new healthcare system for the United States where instead of people getting health insurance from an insurance company, often provided through their workplace, everyone in America would be on a program provided through the federal government. It has become a favorite of progressives, and was heavily championed by Senator Bernie Sanders (D-Vermont) during his runs for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020.

Pros
Universal healthcare lowers health care costs for the economy overall, since the government controls the price of medication and medical services through regulation and negotiation.

It would also eliminate the administrative cost of working with multiple private health insurers. Doctors would only have to deal with one government agency, rather than multiple private insurance companies along with Medicare and Medicaid.

Companies would not have to hire staff to deal with many different health insurance companies’ rules. Instead, billing procedures and coverage rules would be standardized.

Hospitals and doctors would be forced to provide the same standard of service at a low cost, instead of targeting wealthy clients and offering expensive services so they can get a higher profit.

Universal healthcare leads to a healthier population. Studies show that preventive care lowers expensive emergency room usage. Before Obamacare, 46% of emergency room patients were there because they had nowhere else to go. 

The emergency room became their primary care physician. This type of health care inequality is a major factor in the rising cost of medical care.


Cons
Some analysts are concerned that the government may not be able to use its bargaining power to drive down costs as steeply and as quickly as Sanders predicts. Thorpe argues that Sanders is overly optimistic on this aspect of the bill.

Other analysts are concerned that insulating people from costs of care will drive up usage of medical care. Drew Altman, who heads the Kaiser Family Foundation, pointed out that “no other developed nation has zero out of pocket costs.”

People may not be as careful with their health if they do not have a financial incentive to do so.

Governments have to limit health care spending to keep costs down. Doctors might have less incentive to provide quality care if they aren’t well paid. 

They may spend less time per patient in order to keep costs down. They also have less funding for new life-saving technologies.

Since the government focuses on providing basic and emergency health care, most universal healthcare systems report long wait times for elective procedures. 

The government may also limit services with a low probability of success, and may not cover drugs for rare conditions.