Singer-payer Medicare for all would be cheaper than the current system

Michael Ramirez’s Friday editorial cartoon showed Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as a child writing 1+1=21 trillion dollars on a chalkboard. This meaningless bit of blather is to help underline the real message of the cartoon, which is that Medicare for all will cost $32 trillion over 10 years.

So how much will the current system cost? In 2017, we spent $3.5 trillion on medical care. With no inflation and no increase in population, this would add up to $35 trillion over the next 10 years. Factor in inflation and higher costs, and leaving things the way they are means we will spend more than $40 trillion over the next 10 years. Single-payer Medicare for all will probably save us about $10 trillion over the same period.

Perhaps Republicans should emulate the late Paul Harvey and include “the rest of the story” when trying to frighten us into opposing that which is in our best interests.