Colorado Voters Reject Single-Payer Health Care System

Colorado voters have rejected Amendment 69, the “Colorado Creation of ColoradoCare System Initiative,” a proposed constitutional amendment that would have replaced most private health insurance with a fully government/taxpayer-paid system for all Colorado citizens.

9News.com reports that early results of the Colorado polls show an overwhelming defeat of the single-payer system. Because the system is a universal, government-paid initiative, it would have ended Obamacare, a result that many have said is the ultimate goal of Barack Obama’s signature health care law: to raise premiums so high and restrict choices so much that Americans would clamor for a fully government-paid health care system.

As CNBC recently reported, ColoradoCare would have been funded with a 10 percent state income and payroll tax. Employers would have been required to pay two-thirds of the payroll tax, while their workers would have paid one-third. Colorado citizens who are unemployed or deemed below the poverty level would have been covered with full health insurance but would have remained exempt from the tax.

Opponents of the amendment — who have expressed concern about the long-term funding for the government insurance program — have been Democrat Gov. John Hickenlooper and Progress Now.

“We’re grateful to the people of Colorado for carefully considering Amendment 69 and voting overwhelmingly against a measure that was clearly risky, untested, and fiscally irresponsible,” said Kelly Brough, president and CEO of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce and chair of Coloradans for Coloradans. “We worked hard to build a coalition of groups across the political spectrum, and we came together to explain how ColoradoCare would have been devastating to working families, small business and Colorado’s economy.”

“An analysis by the Colorado Health Institute concluded that ColoradoCare would break even in its first year but would ‘slide into ever-increasing deficits’ longer-term without tax increases,” reported CNBC.