In Bob Shrum’s book, he correctly claimed–in a sea of incorrect allegations–that I razzed John Kerry for his failure to propose a universal health care plan. I plead guilty as charged. I razzed Bill Bradley and Howard Dean about that, too…and it’s always the same issue: About 1/3 of the 45 million people who don’t have health insurance are mostly young people–healthy, wealthy and wise–who simply choose not to buy in because they’re…healthy. I believe they have a civic responsibility to buy in, just as they have a legal responsibility to buy auto insurance. Here’s why: If they don’t buy in and then have the misfortune of running their motorcycle into a tree, the rest of us pay for the hospital bill. I also believe they have a moral responsibility to expand the risk pool and lower the costs for the rest of us codgers, especially those who have pre-existing conditions. They’ll be codgers someday, too.
The Democrats I’ve spoken with about this–Republicans, except for Mitt Romney who passed a mandatory plan, aren’t vaguely interested in universal–never actually say why they won’t demand a universal mandate, but the reason isn’t hard to discern:
it’s scary. For a politician like Barack Obama, who has a large constituency among young people, it’s especially scary. I’ve had the conversation with him, too, publicly, in the cover story I wrote about him last fall and he said this:
“If there’s a way of doing it voluntarily, that’s more consonant with the American character…If you can’t solve the problem without the government stepping in, that’s when you make it mandatory.”
Well, Obama was as good as his word. His universal health care plan is not universal. There are plenty of other problems with it, too–starting with the responsibility it places on employers to provide health insurance. The only way we’ll actually pass a universal plan in this country, over the objections of the insurance industry, is if we offer corporate America a carrot: If they “cash out” their current health benefits and give them to their employees in the form of higher wages, the government will create a universal system based on tax credits. (This is the basis of Senator Ron Wyden’s health plan, which I’ve touted in the past.) And so, I can’t pretend I’m not disappointed in the Obama proposal. Still waiting for Hillary–with whom I’ve also had this conversation–to announce her plan for universality.
Walter Shapiro also has some telling details about Obama on the stump.
And for those with questions about the specifics of the universal plan that I favor, you can link to the Ron Wyden plan here.