The eye-popping cost of Medicare for All

[Gothmog]

167. Read the studies being used to support these single payer plans

sanders and the persons pushing these single payer plans cite a couple of studies that promise $5.1 trillion is savings that will pay for these plans. I read the studies and saw that these studies all talk about savings to society and not tax revenues. See these DU threads https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211497483 and https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211531815

I used to be a college debater and I know now studies such as the one cited above are prepared. It seems that there are some fairly aggressive assumptions used in this study and I doubt that these savings will be realized in the real world. There is a reason why sanders has totally and utterly failed to get his magical single payer plan adopted in the real world which is that policy makers cannot us magical or theoretical savings to pay for a program.

Prof. Krugman and I treat the so-called societal savings the same way that we both treat the magical economic growth that is supposed to be generated from GOP tax cuts. http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/01/19/weakened-at-bernies/?_r=0

On health care: leave on one side the virtual impossibility of achieving single-payer. Beyond the politics, the Sanders “plan” isn’t just lacking in detail; as Ezra Klein notes, it both promises more comprehensive coverage than Medicare or for that matter single-payer systems in other countries, and assumes huge cost savings that are at best unlikely given that kind of generosity. This lets Sanders claim that he could make it work with much lower middle-class taxes than would probably be needed in practice.

To be harsh but accurate: the Sanders health plan looks a little bit like a standard Republican tax-cut plan, which relies on fantasies about huge supply-side effects to make the numbers supposedly add up. Only a little bit: after all, this is a plan seeking to provide health care, not lavish windfalls on the rich — and single-payer really does save money, whereas there’s no evidence that tax cuts deliver growth. Still, it’s not the kind of brave truth-telling the Sanders campaign pitch might have led you to expect.

GOP tax cuts are not magical and never pay for themselves.

If you want this study to be taken seriously in the real world, then identify how the plan will be paid for. A government cannot spend magical savings and can only use tax revenues. The study identify societal savings which are nice but which are not tax revenues

The real world is a nice place. Magical savings are nice but cannot be used in the real world. sanders has utterly and completely failed to get his magical plan adopted anywhere including Vermont. sanders is careful to never tell anyone how he would pay for his program and cite amusing but worthless studies like the one in the OP. No governmental entity have accepted sanders plan because it would need a large raise in taxes.

The real world is a nice place.