What You Need to Know About Single Payer in California

Single payer healthcare could prove to be disastrous for California.

In the midst of the GOP health care debacle, public officials on the Democratic side of the aisle are beginning to take advantage of the situation and praise radical alternatives to our current health care system. When speaking about the future of health care in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Senator Elizabeth Warren asserted her position saying, “Now it’s time for the next step. And the next step is single payer.” Senator Bernie Sanders is calling for “Medicare for All,” and is planning to introduce a bill to the Senate floor in the upcoming weeks. During his 2016 presidential bid, he provided a detailed, yet very costly plan on his website.

Here is the bad news for the left wingers of the Democratic Party: when it comes to advocating for universal health care in the United States, talk is cheap. If implementing single payer health care was so simple, Colorado and Vermont would’ve succeeded in their recent attempts to do so. With momentum in its state legislature, California is next on the list to try.

If California was a country, its approximately $2.5 trillion economy would rank directly behind the United Kingdom as sixth largest in the world. Thus, California has the capacity to experiment with a single payer system. However, the state must be prepared to pay the bill and displace the private insurance market.

The Healthy California Act, a bill to implement a single payer system that passed California’s State Senate, would cost anywhere from $331 to $400 billion dollars, which is more than the state’s entire budget. Under the bill, those receiving private insurance, employer-based coverage, Medicare, and Medicaid would all lose their existing coverage and be subject to the centralized state system. Illegal immigrants will also be eligible for coverage. Copays and deductibles would be prohibited, and all 40 million California residents would be eligible to see a specialist without a referral.