Medicare for All

During the run-up to passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), I wrote a number of posts (here, here, and here) assessing the ACA very negatively, and pointing out the shortcomings of the various versions of this bill, preceding its final passage. My focus was on contrasting varying versions with HR 676, the Conyers-Kucinich Medicare for All bill, in relation to its likely impact on fatalities, bankruptcies and divorces attributed to lack of health insurance coverage in the US.

At that time, about 47 million people were uninsured, and based on the rate of 1,000 fatalities per million established by the Wolper-Woolhandler-Himmelstein et al study of 2007-2009, I anticipated 47,000 fatalities in 2010. In addition, I predicted that

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This is a quick one. On the Ed Schultz show on August 9th, Jonathan Alter and Michael Kinsley joined Ed to give their views on the Joe Soptic Ad from Priorities USA Action and the Republican reaction to it. more »

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During the past few months the results of polling suggest that Barack Obama will be re-elected. But they also show that his support is shallow and could be shaken easily by an economic downturn during the next 6 months. more »

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In my last post, I discussed the first part of Beowulf's post entitled: “(MMT − JG) + Medicare for All = MMT,” and also some dialogues between Jamie Galbraith and both TomThumb and Beowulf related to the MMT Job Guarantee at more »

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This is the third and last installment of a critical review of Dean Baker's second reaction to the debate kicked off by the more »

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This is the second installment of a critical review of Dean Baker's second reaction to the debate kicked off by the more »

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Dean Baker added to his previous discussion on MMT in a second post in reply to some of the comments on his first one. more »

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After stating his general approval for Dylan Matthews's, MMT post on Ezra Klein's blog, and his agreement with MMT on the issue of solvency, a big point that MMT's been trying to get across to the mainstream for years, more »

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On Wednesday forty radicals in the United States Senate took an extremist position by voting to end Medicare.

That simple sentence will be challenged by a lot of political and media people. They'll say I don't understand the popular mood, and that I'm applying my own values to Wednesday's vote. But I can prove this statement is true, using only a dictionary and some polling data. They'll even say they didn't vote to end Medicare! But that can be proved, too.

When 40% of the Senate votes for a policy that's opposed by 78% of the public, it suggests that one of our political parties has been profoundly radicalized. In a two-party system, that's a serious challenge for democracy.

A radical, extremist vote

Rep. Paul Ryan's budget proposal was rejected by 57-40. All the Senate's Democrats voted against it, and so did Republican Senators Rand Paul, Olympia Snowe, Scott Brown, Susan Collins, and Lisa Murkowski. On Medicare at least, these five Republicans did not reveal themselves to be radicals or extremists on Wednesday. Good for them.

Let's be clear: Americans in all walks of life, including politics, have every right to hold radical or extremist views. Some of our best and noblest ideas have come from radicals. The abolition of slavery, a woman's right to vote, financial security for elderly and disabled Americans -- each was considered a radical or extreme position at some point in history.

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The Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) approach to economics must be starting to make some waves, because today, Paul Krugman, followed his earlier attack on it and his debate with Jamie Galbraith and others last summer, with more »

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