If we reimagine these premiums as taxes, we’d realize that Americans pay some of the highest and least progressive labor taxes in the developed world.
Just how heavy is the burden placed on American workers by employer insurance premiums? By combining data from the O.E.C.D. Taxing Wages model with data from the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey, we can see what percentage of each worker’s compensation — a figure that includes cash wages as well as the taxes and benefits employers pay on behalf of their employees — goes toward taxes and health care, and how progressive these payments really are.
What this data shows is that lower-income workers, higher-income workers, single workers, and married workers with children all contribute around 40 percent of their pay toward taxes and health premiums. And when those health care costs are taken into account, the less well off no longer pay less than high-earners, as they do in taxes alone.
So, while opponents of comprehensive plans like Medicare for All claim those plans will greatly burden middle-class families, the truth is that we already have an unfair system. Middle-class workers in America are charged the same health insurance fees as upper-class workers despite the vast income differences between the two groups, and pay more of their earnings toward taxes and health care than workers in many wealthy countries.
For instance, according to this analysis, American families that earn around $43,000, half of the average wage, pay 37 percent of their wages to taxes and health care premiums. In high-tax Finland, the same type of family pays 23 percent of their compensation in labor taxes, which includes taxes they pay to support universal health care. In France, it’s 2 percent. In the United Kingdom and Canada, it is less than 0 percent after government benefits.
kejigoto on April 29th, 2019 at 12:26 UTC »
I'll never understand the mentality of "well my insurance doesn't suck so fuck everyone else who doesn't have access to the same insurance." Like some people think basic fucking medical care is a privilege they somehow earned and now must keep others from because they don't deserve it as much as those with a good job.
I've got 100% coverage and pay nothing out of pocket thankfully but I'd love for others to have access to the same thing, even if it means paying a little more in taxes so there isn't a deductible, monthly rates, and more.
Watching a coworker right now battle cancer on a shitty policy while also having everyone pitch in hours to help them get time off because they have fucking cancer and are too ill to work.
According to some this person should have just gotten a better job with better insurance plans if they were gonna get cancer.
Unreal.
Juncopf on April 29th, 2019 at 11:32 UTC »
i don’t understand how people are fine with spending thousands on insurance premiums and then still having to pay a lot out of pocket, but then turn around and screech at the thought of their taxes being raised instead
amplified_mess on April 29th, 2019 at 10:52 UTC »
This is where the debate needs to go. It’s not about “dirty socialists” vs. “f u I got mine Trump supporters” - nor is it about “death panels” vs “doing what’s right”
If it can save the average American money, then more people will be on board.