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The plan marks her campaign’s first detailed foray into health care policy, and comes after Warren’s embrace of Medicare for All, a system of government-run health insurance pushed by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, has been criticized by her opponents who said she had not been straightforward about its cost.
In a Medium post published Friday, Warren offered her 9,275-word retort, projecting a health care system that she said would cost slightly less than the projected cost of the current system over the same period — $52 trillion — but would cover everyone and would cut out the need for individual health care spending.
“Over the next ten years, individuals will spend $11 trillion on health care in the form of premiums, deductibles, copays, and out-of-pocket costs,” Warren wrote. “Under my Medicare for All plan, that amount will drop from $11 trillion to practically zero.”
Her plan marks a departure from Sanders’ approach to funding Medicare for All, which he has said will require raising taxes on the middle class. At September’s presidential debate and in other public appearances, Warren was been unwilling to say that, causing some of her rivals to call her evasive.
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Warren would fund her plan with $8.8 trillion in employer contributions, and nearly $7 trillion in taxes on financial firms, large corporations, and a higher wealth tax on people with more than a billion dollars. Those wealthy individuals would be taxed 6 cents on each dollar above a billion. That is on top of Warren’s previously proposed “ultra millionaire tax” — a centerpiece of her campaign — that levies a 2-cent tax on fortunes above $50 million.
Warren also said her plan would generate $1.4 trillion for the system from taxes at existing rates on the additional take-home pay of Americans since many of them will no longer have health care premiums deducted from their paychecks. She also said some funding for the plan could come from immigration reform and defense spending cuts.
Warren backed up her cost and revenue estimates with analyses from economists and health care experts, including Donald Berwick, Simon Johnson, Betsey Stevenson, and Mark Zandi.
Former vice president Joe Biden’s campaign attacked Warren’s plan in a statement issued on Friday, claiming her funding proposals amount to a steep tax hike on the middle class.
“The mathematical gymnastics in this plan are all geared towards hiding a simple truth from voters: it’s impossible to pay for Medicare for All without middle class tax increases. To accomplish this sleight of hand, her proposal dramatically understates its cost, overstates its savings, inflates the revenue, and pretends that an employer payroll tax increase is something else,” Biden aide Kate Bedingfield said.
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Warren’s rise in national and early state polls has come with increased scrutiny from her 2020 campaign rivals, which boiled over during the October debate as she fended off criticism of her Medicare for All stance from moderates. They hit Warren over the costs and feasibility, and argued for more incremental changes to the existing, largely private, health care system.
It was a criticism Warren directly addressed in her proposal on Friday, challenging other Democratic candidates to explain how they would provide health care coverage fo everyone.
“Or, if they are unwilling to do that, they should concede that they think it’s more important to protect the eye-popping profits of private insurers and drug companies and the immense fortunes of the top 1% and giant corporations,” Warren wrote.
The topic of health care has been front and center at every Democratic primary debate this year, and regularly ranks near the top of issues that concern voters in opinion polls. That made Warren’s lack of a comprehensive health care plan a weak spot for a candidate who’s campaign mantra has been “I’ve got a plan for that.” Since the beginning of her run for president, Warren has released dozens of detailed proposals ranging from immigration to the use of federal lands.
Though Democratic voters generally agree the health care system needs fixing, they’re split on how to do it. A national Quinnipiac poll released in September found 49 percent of Democratic voters in favor of replacing private health care with Medicare for All, while 44 percent want to keep the existing system and build on the Affordable Care Act.
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Christina Prignano of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Jess Bidgood can be reached at Jess.Bidgood@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter@jessbidgood
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