According to a recent poll, more millennials today would prefer to live in a socialist nation than a capitalist one.
Personally, I don’t think these numbers express a true hatred of the free-market system. Instead, I think these numbers point to the extreme hopelessness this indebted generation feels… and the difficult economic conditions this generation inherited.
Which is the reason why Sen. Bernie Sanders became so popular with this demographic. At one point in 2016, Sanders had as much as 84% of the millennial vote. Altogether, he received more primary votes from this age group than Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump combined.
One of the most popular campaign ideas Sanders proposed that resonated with this young generation was the notion that: “Health care should be a right of all people, not a privilege.”
Of course, Sanders ultimately lost the Democratic nomination to Clinton. But that hasn’t stopped him from continuing to advocate for a single-payer, government-run health care system.
In fact, Sanders, along with Sen. Kamala Harris and one-third of the country’s Democratic senators, introduced a bill in the Senate last fall that proposed a government-run “Medicare for All” program.
A similar proposal was introduced by Rep. John Conyers in the House, where 117 Democrats voiced their backing.
This bill proposed that the government would become the “single payer” of all health care expenses – including dental and vision care. There would be no charge for doctor’s visits – routine or otherwise. No charge at the emergency room, either. No deductibles, copays, or anything like that.
Proponents point to countries like Canada, the U.K., Switzerland, Australia, Denmark, and Hong Kong – along with many others, as examples of developed countries that have already implemented government-run universal health care.
But is health care in those nations really as great as it sounds? According to Business Insider…
In Canada, doctors have waiting lists and the process is more like getting into a country club where you have to be recommended by other members.
Special equipment, like MRI machines, always have a waiting list and work around the clock, so it is not unusual to get an appointment a month or two out, with a middle of the night time slot.
According to the Pacific Research Institute, it’s so bad that 52,000 Canadians come to the U.S. every year to receive the medical care they need, but refuse to wait for.
It’s a similar story in the U.K… where waiting lists are so bad that nearly 300,000 citizens had to wait six months or longer for treatment.
One Swedish economist confessed that his country’s health care system is “such a colossal failure that few in the Left today view the memory as something positive.” That’s why 10% of that country’s population has reverted back to private health insurance.
Of course, there’s another big problem. Simply having “free” access to medical care doesn’t necessarily mean that the quality of care is decent.
According to two separate studies of Medicare recipients conducted by the RAND Corporation and the Oregon Health Study, providing Medicare for All health insurance doesn’t equate with better health.
Of course, there’s another big problem. Simply having “free” access to medical care doesn’t necessarily mean that the quality
of care is decent.
After all, you can go to your doctor as often as you’d like… but if you smoke a carton of cigarettes a day, are obese, and inherited poor genes – you’re probably not going to live to 100.
Another side effect that nobody talks about is how a government-run plan would stifle medical innovation.
Today, companies will willingly operate at a deficit for years at a time on the quest for a drug that could be worth billions of dollars a year – more than enough to quickly earn back the cost of developing the new treatment.
Under a government-run health care system, some sort of price control would likely be in place… meaning it could take decades or longer for innovators to be compensated for their discoveries. That could be enough to deter our nation’s top medical minds from wasting years on a discovery that comes with little-to-no payoff.
Of course, we haven’t even discussed the economic impacts of a Medicare for All plan. According to estimates from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, a Medicare for All program would cost $15 trillion over the next 10 years.
Somebody has to pay for it all.
And nearly all of the options Sanders has proposed focus on higher taxes. For starters, there would be a 7.5% payroll tax, and a new 4% income tax… as well as a potential “wealth tax” on folks above a certain net-worth threshold.
There’s absolutely no evidence that government- run health care would improve the quality of medical services here in the U.S.
In fact, the only thing it would unquestionably do is contribute even further to our country’s weak financial footing.
According to research from the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, Medicare/Medicaid
is already one of the key drivers of our nation’s debt.
Yet even so, this crazy idea already has the support of as many as two-thirds of Americans. Among millennials, 69% of the generation supports a government guarantee of health insurance for all.
But our federal government is already 100% tapped out. Not a penny is available for a program like this.
Which is why I think Medicare for All will be such an important tool leveraged by progressive Democrats in the 2020 election.
Of course, this wouldn’t be the first time a broad-reaching welfare program like this was implemented in America…
After the Civil War, hundreds of thousands of American widows or orphans were struggling to get by. A Civil War pension program passed in 1862, providing heirs with checks based on what the deceased veteran was making.
Then came the Great Depression, which left more than half of the elderly population in poverty. Upon winning the Democratic nomination in the 1932 presidential election, Franklin D. Roosevelt proposed a “New Deal” that ultimately created Social Security to help retirees.
You may remember when President Lyndon Johnson declared “unconditional war” on poverty in the 1960s. He created the modern welfare system of Medicare and Medicaid… expanded Social Security benefits… and the food-stamps program.
But our federal government is already 100% tapped out. Not a penny is available for a program like this.
We’ve already had to borrow nearly $1 trillion in 2018 just to cover the federal government’s spending. We’re adding more and more every year to the $21 trillion in outstanding U.S. government debt. Within five years, the interest alone on the debt will eclipse the massive amount of money we spend on the U.S. military.
There’s simply no more money available.
That won’t stop the progressive promises. But it will be a huge, huge hit to the economy. It will crush businesses and the stock market, and have far-reaching impacts on the way of life we’ve enjoyed for decades.
And it’s coming… whether you’re ready or not.
Porter Stansberry is the founder of financial-research firm Stansberry Research and a regular American Consequences contributor. His P&C Insurance Monitor is available to lifetime subscribers of his flagship research service, Stansberry’s Investment Advisory.
