Getting rid of employer based insurance should be pretty easy, at least from a persuasive standpoint, mostly because both Republican free marketeers and left leaning people both want to get rid of it. And there are a lot of reasons to get rid of it. You lose it when you lose your job, your insurance bounces around from being great to being terrible based on the whims of whatever company hires you, you're afraid to quit a job because you have a family that might need insurance, let your company focus on the company and not on having Betty from HR negotiate with insurers who do that for a living, etc

They are right that the counterpoint is that the status quo works out for a lot of people, at least in the short term, and it's hard to move from that.

Pretty sure the empirical reality is solving that for the left, no fictions necessary here:



Dreams of being fabulously wealthy are eroding due to the present reality that plenty of wealth is being generated but most people aren't getting it. Therefore the popularity of taxing the wealthy and corporations and distributing the collected resources as health care provisions is probably coming not from aspirations and imagination but instead a cold calculation about who has money and what people would like to have (health care) if they had more money.

So ANOTHER good reason this is a great strategy for the Democrats is that it is not the right-winger plan of selling people false hopes of sharing in the riches if they do nothing but instead that through collective action and using the coercive taxation power of the state, they can have things.

One good way to get 60 Senators in the Senate is to propose popular things people want. See the last time you said basically the same thing and Fly responded with the same idea.

That's what we are saying. Support for single payer falls once you tack on the realities of who will pay and whose health care plans will be changing.

Any poll that simply asks "Do you support single payer" is not useful. Of course many people want healthcare and they want unfortunate others to have it too. But at what cost to their own do they continue support. That isn't nearly so popular.

Seems like the obvious solution is to push to single payer and use that drive to push to accept more and more universal and single payer like fixes and solutions if that's what's possible and more to single payer if that's possible.

Well it would be easier to get you to agree with the change if I could promise you that:

1) the new plan would be cheaper, both for you, your employer, and for the govt
2) you would see no decline in coverage, in fact you'd likely get more
3) you would see no decline in providers, in fact you'd get more access as well
4) you'd see no increase in wait times

Obviously if this was presented to you you'd probably go for it, but unfortunately everyone who understands this issue pretty much knows there are going to be some unpleasant trade offs for someone, and those who are on the side of SP pretty much make no secret of that. I think that's a big part of the problem with the current debate. The people on the left or center right who support single payer or some similar form of UHC are for the most part pretty honest about the plusses and minuses of it. Meanwhile the right wing crazies get to go on and on about government takeovers of health care and death panels and how a kid in England was murdered by a judge's ruling with no concern whatsoever for facts and logic, and somehow they get taken seriously. I feel like the liberal side of this discussion should just promise everyone a free pony, win the elections, get the legislation passed, and then deal with fixing some of the inherent problems afterward. The right is going to call everyone involved liars regardless of whether they are or not, so what's to be lost exactly?

Didn't the ACA take care of that? I doubt health care is at the top of peoples lists if they had money. It only seems to matter when one has to use it.

Just eliminate the employer healthcare deduction and count down the clock to single payer IMO

This might be my most hated item in the tax code.

Is there any appetite for that?

I heard it suggested in Canada, where employer insurance is only for things above and beyond what provincial insurance covers, and I think most people were against it because its another "tax on the middle class"

Obama used some of the bolded in his arguments for the ACA, and I think it's a great piece of messaging the Democrats should be using to push for single payer. Obviously a huge chunk of this country doesn't give a flying **** about moral imperative, right/wrong, taking care of the poor and sick... But they sure do care about the economy. So you include something like...

"Single payer healthcare would be the single greatest boost to our economy since the dot com boom... Overnight we could unleash the creativity and entrepreneurial spirit of so many Americans who are currently locked out of that marketplace by a need for health insurance. 40-year-old Dads who have a great idea for a new business, but can't risk going for it because they need health insurance to take care of their family, 25-year-olds who would benefit from being able to rise up the ladder with other companies or jump out and start their own, and 55-year-olds who have worked with one company for decades but are seeing loyalties disappear and would benefit from making a change... All of these people will be able to continue pursuing their dreams, the American Dream, and that will be a tremendous boost for the economy. We have the greatest workers, the greatest minds, and the greatest entrepreneurial spirits in the world here in America... It's time to unleash them again! Oh, and by the way, companies won't have to worry about providing benefits anymore either... So that's more money in their pockets and more money to go around."

Obviously the last part doesn't hold up to scrutiny since that money will just be going to taxes for single payer instead, more or less (slightly less, since single payer is more cost effective), but it'll resonate with a lot of people and that's what you need here.

This type of frame for the issue shifts the field of play from "job-killing, economy crushing healthcare reform," vs. "no it won't," to "job-killing, economy crushing healthcare reform," vs. "job-creating, economy boosting, freedom unleashing healthcare reform."

Too often, Democrats are taking on frames for arguments in which they cannot win and can only hope to not lose. Frame it so that you can win every argument you are participating in.

The fact that this isn't the message of the Democratic party tells me that they don't actually want single payer. The only other alternative is that they are complete ****ing morons.

This is still an argument about the popularity rather than the merits!

Let's be honest, it's both.

I think they believe that fighting openly for single payer is a third rail for them, which makes them complete ****ing morons.

Edited to add: It's only a third rail if they fight for it with ineffective arguments and aren't able to frame the debate in a way that is favorable to them (or at least fair). I'm so sick of watching Democrats let Republicans frame the debate on key issues.

There are many versions of UHC I would support over the current system. I'm not sure many of them would achieve popular support either.

The Dems problem is they need to find one flavor that is popular enough. The cover-everything, replace-every-existing-plan system is going to be difficult to find popular support for. Perhaps the current strategy of letting things deteriorate until there is no choice will be the easiest way to achieve their goals.

This is my instinct, too, but I think it's wrong. I think this is the trap that Hillary and other technocrats fall into (and why I tend to find those people appealing). I can imagine Hillary putting out multiple white papers on the kind of UHC model that might work best, and the pros and cons of each. And I'm confident that she could answer a debate question in great detail, including tax subsidies that phase out slowly at various income levels to make sure that no one faces a killer marginal cliff at any point on the income curve.

Meanwhile, Trump promises everyone great healthcare - cheaper and better - and people are just like, "derp, that sounds great".

So pound the drum on the goal - universal coverage that can't be stripped away when you get sick and doesn't tie you down to your employer's whim. I think it's a loser's game during an election to try and figure out whether you want to emulate Great Britain or Canada or Germany, or how to build a Frankenstein's monster out of those models.

Lol....I mean the ACA was a difficult sell because of Obama's Muslim faith and death panels......but I'm sure the lack of those kind of persuasive arguments against single payer mean smooth sailing and massive election wins! If the DemE are a bunch of morons, i struggle to even find a word for you guys.

This is, INCREDIBLY, still an argument about popular support! Imaginary, hypothetical popular support, mind you, given the poll cited.

Yo man I think everyone already knew I was right you don't need to keep proving it.

The ACA was a tough sell because it was complicated, self-sabotaged by Obama's insane need to compromise, and a frankly comical belief that the media would reward good faith negotiations.

But like I told the other guy, my point is already made, it's flattering that you guys won't stop giving me evidence but I really don't need it.

Listen we can't do anything that doesn't already exist, maybe maybe we could try to like not make your life worse, but uh, vote for me anyway?

Get the **** out of here. We're not dealing with a hypothetical, we tried it your way, Donald ****ing Trump is President.

"We can't propose good left wing policy, Republicans will say awful things about it. We should instead support worse centrist policy."

[provides, without prompting, an example of Republicans saying awful things about prior centrist policies]

Yeah man seems y'all got this figured out, put me down to volunteer for Hillary's re-election campaign.

Again, i don't have anything figured out. I don't know how to win elections, you are delusional enough to think YOU do. I'm just pointing and laughing at your near Sklansky level of thinking. Saying that the fact that I can't come up with persuasive arguments against single payer means its not a tough sell is just dumb. Really, really dumb.

A major issue is that many politicians simply don't know anything substantive about health care. The only thing they know is that most people want it and giving it to them will increase their chances of being reelected. I mean if they can't fully comprehend our current system, how would they grasp the ins-and-outs of a system they have no actual experience with?

My main fear is that the Dems take power in 2019, try to enhance Obamacare and basically do exactly what the Republicans just did last week.

Considering how beholden some in their own caucus are to the pharmaceutical industry (I'm looking at you, Corey Booker and Bob Casey) that may be the case, but the Ds won't be in power in 2019. Best case scenario is a slim congressional majority with TRUMP as POTUS for at least two more years.

2020 is going to be for all the marbles, imo, as we'll get another round of redistricting then.