Now is the time for Medicare for all

It’s time for Medicare for all

One important aspect of our current turmoil over health care coverage is seldom remarked upon: placing the burden of providing such insurance on businesses (the majority of us get our coverage through our employers) comprises a substantial “tax” on commerce. That is to say, because a firm needs to provide this benefit for its employees, it must charge significantly more for its goods and services. Where these products are involved in international commerce – customers from outside the U.S. – it puts our industries at an unfair disadvantage relative to companies from countries where businesses don’t have to take on this expense.

The answer is the one every other industrialized country in the world except us has arrived at: single-payer coverage for all our citizens, Medicare for all. Now is the time.

Rather than continuing, or exacerbating, a system where for-profit entities reap a substantial proportion of our health care dollar, we need to move to a single-payer system. It makes sense from both a humanitarian and financial perspective.

Mike Bradley

Hillsboro