But if we enact single payer, your taxes will go up!

[RichVRichV]

43. Funny enough I just had this discussion with someone else.

I calculated what it would cost if we payed for it using a flat payroll tax that everyone contributed to equally (one of many ways it could be payed for). You can see the post here.

This is based on the single payer bill that was submitted to congress a while back and estimated to cost $15 trillion over 10 years, or average $1.5 trillion a year.

We know that in 2014 Medicare raised $227.4 billion for 2.9% of payroll. That comes out to $78.414 billion raised per 1% taxed. For a $1.5 trillion program, that comes out to about a 19.2% tax. That can either go all 19.2% on the employee or 9.6% on employee and 9.6% on the employer (like other payroll taxes).



All someone has to do is take their gross pay from a paycheck, subtract 19.2% off of it (or 9.6% if it's a split payment like social security and medicare), and add back what they currently deduct for health care.

A recent average gross paycheck for me was $550. I spend $49.31 a paycheck on health insurance. If all 19.2% comes out of my paycheck then I would spend $105.60 and get back $49.31 (from current insurance) for a total of $56.29 of reduced income. If it's split between employee and employer, like other payroll taxes, then it would cost my employer $52.80 and me an additional $3.49 a paycheck (weekly).



Again, this is only one of many ways it could be payed for. It's just a very simple way to calculate.