Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) “Medicare for all” government-run healthcare scheme will cost $32 trillion over the next 10 years and would require “historic” tax increases to pay for it, according to a new study released on Monday.
The Mercatus Center at George Mason University analyzed a proposal from Sanders’ socialized medicine plan and found that it will cost $32 trillion over the next ten years.
Charles Blahous, the study author, said, “Enacting something like ‘Medicare for all’ would be a transformative change in the size of the federal government.”
Blahous argues that the estimates for the $32 trillion price tag are relatively conservative because they assume that Sanders’ bill achieves its goals of reducing payments to health providers, as well as lowering drug prices and administrative costs.
The Mercatus Center suggested that doubling federal individual and corporate income tax would not cover the costs of the “Medicare for all” plan.
The Associated Press (AP) noted that the proposal would require “historic” tax increases to pay for the single-payer healthcare proposal.
A spokesman for Sanders’ office said that they have not analyzed the cost of the government-run healthcare plan, however, Mercatus’ study falls in line with other estimates.
Last year, the non-partisan Urban Institute found that single-payer health care would cost roughly $32 trillion. Even the Washington Post admitted last year that the would plan would be “astonishingly” expensive.
Kenneth Thorpe, a health policy professor at Emory Unversity, authored one study that found similar results to the Mercatus paper.
Thorpe explained, “It’s showing that if you are going to go in this direction, it’s going to cost the federal government $2.5 trillion to $3 trillion a year in terms of spending.”
“Even though people don’t pay premiums, the tax increases are going to be enormous. There are going to be a lot of people who’ll pay more in taxes than they save on premiums,” Thorpe added.