Elizabeth Warren 2020 campaign megathread

[icemanj]

Anyone see this poll? https://www.msubillings.edu/cas/nams/polls/2019%20Mountain%20States%20Poll%20Report.pdf

Warren 82 - Biden 0 (WY)

Yeah, it was a poll of 14 people. Yes, literally 14.

Not something that could be considered scientific by any reasonable measure. Maybe the people they asked were all in the same family?

I know. It's bizarre that something like this would even be released.

[Beet]

Anyone see this poll? https://www.msubillings.edu/cas/nams/polls/2019%20Mountain%20States%20Poll%20Report.pdf

Warren 82 - Biden 0 (WY)

Yeah, it was a poll of 14 people. Yes, literally 14.

Not something that could be considered scientific by any reasonable measure. Maybe the people they asked were all in the same family?

I know. It's bizarre that something like this would even be released.

Not to defend this trash poll, but how do you get 82% from a sample size of 14?

[Cinemark]

I might be wrong, but i thought that 14 respondents was a subsample of a larger survey.

[GP270watch]

 Another day and another hedge fund manager crapping his pants about a Warren presidency.

The market will drop 25% if Warren wins the election, says hedge fund legend Paul Tudor Jones

 He prefers Mayor Pete, the Democrat that all the big money finance guys seem to love.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

She would lose against Trump.

She might be able to get Michigan back but that’s it, and Arizona wouldn’t turn blue.  Pennsylvania and Wisconsin would stay Trump.  Florida certainly.

She would lose worse than Hillary.

Any credible challenger to Trump will win WI, MI and PA

[Progressive Pessimist]

She would lose against Trump.

She might be able to get Michigan back but that’s it, and Arizona wouldn’t turn blue.  Pennsylvania and Wisconsin would stay Trump.  Florida certainly.

She would lose worse than Hillary.

Any credible challenger to Trump will win WI, MI and PA

The fact that you're saying this now makes me think we're doomed no matter what...

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

We are not doomed

[Shadows]

Larry Krasner was thought of a would be Bernie surrogate of sorts so this is a coup of sorts for Warren as was Raul Grijalva although both of them have little to know influence on national or even early state polls so it is not a much deal but still Warren has clawed some 2016 Bernie backers.

Warren should ideally be leading now given her incredible performance among White Voters but apart from doing poorly among Black Voters, she is failing spectacularly among Hispanic voters as well. So it all depends on how she diversifies her coalition & if she can win both Iowa & NH which she needs because Nevada & SC will be much harder for her.

[OneJ]

Larry Krasner was thought of a would be Bernie surrogate of sorts so this is a coup of sorts for Warren as was Raul Grijalva although both of them have little to know influence on national or even early state polls so it is not a much deal but still Warren has clawed some 2016 Bernie backers.

Warren should ideally be leading now given her incredible performance among White Voters but apart from doing poorly among Black Voters, she is failing spectacularly among Hispanic voters as well. So it all depends on how she diversifies her coalition & if she can win both Iowa & NH which she needs because Nevada & SC will be much harder for her.

You do realize that white voters only make up ~55% or so of the Democratic Primary. If that % was much higher, you'd have a point. Besides, Biden has a huge lead among black voters anyway (and yes, Bernie is way behind too) so it doesn't matter.

According to this, Warren performs about the same with Bernie among black and Hispanic voters. Her base is more white/college-educated than either Biden or Sanders but she's no Buttigieg who doesn't really have either a black or Hispanic base at all. The notion that she fails spectacularly among non-whites is completely false and it's convenient how you ignore that Sanders isn't doing any better and that honestly no one does particularly well among black voters except for Biden.

Of course SC will be much harder for her or anyone else not named Joe Biden in the field. That's a given. However, it's clear that you haven't looked at polls of Nevada which shows her to be competitive with both Sanders and Biden. But, I wish more pollsters would actually poll that state soon.

[Heebie Jeebie]

https://mobile.twitter.com/mj_lee/status/1190245818114158592

[This user has not been convicted of 34 felonies]

Senator Warren releases plan to pay for Medicare For All.

Highlights:

Under my plan, Medicare for All will cover the full list of benefits outlined in the Medicare for All Act, including long-term care, audio, vision, and dental benefits. My plan will cover every single person in the U.S., and includes common-sense payment reforms that make Medicare for All possible without spending any more money overall than we spend now.

No middle class tax increases

Every candidate who opposes my long-term goal of Medicare for All should explain why the "choice" of private insurance plans is more important than being able to choose the doctor that's best for you without worrying about whether they are in-network or not. Why it's more important than being able to choose the right prescription drug for you without worrying about massive differences in copays. Why it's more important than being able to choose to start a small business or choose the job you want without worrying about where your health care coverage will be coming from and how much it will cost.

In recent years, several economists and think tanks have attempted to estimate the cost of a single-payer system in the United States. Those estimates consider how much our nation’s health care spending will change over a ten year window, and range from a $12.5 trillion decrease to a $7 trillion increase. They also consider how much additional money the federal government would need to fund this system, and those estimates range from a low of $13.5 trillion to a high of $34 trillion over ten years.

Because nobody can actually see the future, some of this variation results from different assumptions about how parts of our health care system might work differently under Medicare for All. But most of the difference comes from policy choices. And while the Medicare for All Act is clear about some of these choices – for example, generous benefits, long-term care coverage, and virtually no out-of-pocket expenses – it is silent on a number of really important ones. How much will we pay for medical care and for prescription drugs? What do we do with the existing money that states spend on Medicaid? How aggressively will we cut administrative costs? Aggressive choices mean a lower total cost. Less aggressive choices result in a higher total cost.

Medicare for All will save money by bringing down the staggering administrative costs for insurers in our current system. As the experts I asked to evaluate my plan noted, private insurers had administrative costs of 12% of premiums collected in 2017, while Medicare kept its administrative costs down to 2.3%. My plan will ensure that Medicare for All functions just as efficiently as traditional Medicare by setting net administrative spending at 2.3%.

If we expect the American people to be able to afford health care, we need to rein in these costs. Comprehensive payment reform, as part of Medicare for All, will reduce this component of health care spending. Under my approach, Medicare for All will sharply reduce administrative spending and reimburse physicians and other non-hospital providers at current Medicare rates.

Under my approach, Medicare for All will sharply reduce administrative spending and reimburse hospitals at an average of 110% of current Medicare rates, with appropriate adjustments for rural hospitals, teaching hospitals, and other care providers with challenging cost structures.

Under Medicare for All, hospitals won’t be able to force some patients to pay more because the hospital can’t agree with their insurance company. Instead, because everyone has good insurance, providers will have to compete on better care and reduced wait times in order to attract more patients.

Reining in prescription drug costs should be a top priority for any President – and there’s no better way to do it than through Medicare for All. My administration will use a suite of aggressive policy tools to set a net savings target that will bring down Medicare prices for brand name prescription drugs by 70% and prices for generics by 30%, with an initial focus on more expensive drugs.

Under Medicare for All, the federal government would have real bargaining power to negotiate lower prices for patients. I will adopt an altered version of the mechanism outlined in the Lower Prescription Drug Costs Now Act which leverages excise taxes to bring manufacturers to the table to negotiate prices for both branded and generic drugs, with no drug exceeding 110% of the average international market price, but removes the limit of the number of drugs Medicare can negotiate for and eliminates the “target price” so Medicare could potentially negotiate prices lower than other countries.

If negotiations fail, I will use two tools – compulsory licensing and public manufacturing – to allow my administration to ensure patient access to medicines by either overriding the patent, as modeled in the Medicare Negotiation and Competitive Licensing Act, or by providing public funds to support manufacturing of these drugs, as modeled in my Affordable Drug Manufacturing Act.

Right now, America’s total bill for health care is projected to be $52 trillion for the next ten years. That money will come from four places: the federal government, state governments, employers, and individuals who need care. Under my approach to Medicare for All, most of these funding sources will remain the same, too.

Existing federal spending on Medicare and Medicaid will help fund Medicare for All.

Existing state spending on health insurance will continue in the form of payments to Medicare – but states would be better off because they’d have more long-term predictability, and they’d pay less over time because these costs will grow more slowly than they do today.

Existing total private sector employer contributions to health insurance will continue in the form of contributions to Medicare – but employers would be better off because under the design of my plan, they’d pay less than they would have otherwise.

Here’s the main difference: 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. Under my Medicare for All plan, that amount will drop from $11 trillion to practically zero.

I asked top experts – Mark Zandi, the Chief Economist of Moody’s Analytics; Betsey Stevenson, the former Chief Economist for the Obama Labor Department; and Simon Johnson – to examine options for how we can make up that $11 trillion difference. They conclude that it can be done largely with new taxes on financial firms, giant corporations, and the top 1% – and making sure the rich stop evading the taxes we already have.

That’s right: We don’t need to raise taxes on the middle class by one penny to finance Medicare for All.

Let’s start with a basic fact: American companies are already paying a lot for health care for their employees. They are projected to pay nearly $9 trillion over the next ten years, mostly on employer contributions for employee health insurance and on health-related expenses for employees under workers’ compensation and long-term disability. My idea is that instead of these companies sending those payments to private insurance companies, they would send payments to the federal government for Medicare in the form of an Employer Medicare Contribution.

Small businesses – companies with under 50 employees – would be exempt from this requirement too if they aren’t paying for employee health care today. When either new or existing firms exceed this employee threshold, we would phase in a requirement that companies make Employer Medicare Contributions equal to the national average cost of health care per employee for every employee at that company. Merging firms would pay the weighted average cost of health care per employee of the two firms that are merging.

That way, my plan helps unions that have bargained for good health care already, and creates a significant new incentive for unionization generally by making collective bargaining appealing for both workers and employers as a way of potentially reducing the employer’s Employer Medicare Contributions.

Over time, an employer’s health care cost-per-employee would be gradually shifted to converge at the average health care cost-per-employee nationally. That helps make sure the system is fair but also gives employers and employees time to adapt to the new system.

There are a variety of ways to structure an employer contribution to Medicare for All. This particular approach has the benefit of helping American employers in a few ways:

Employers would collectively save $200 billion over the next ten years.

Employers receive far more certainty about how their health care costs will vary over time and affect their finances.

Small businesses – who often suffer when competing for employees because they can’t afford to offer health care coverage – would no longer be at a competitive disadvantage against bigger businesses.

Employers can reduce their Employer Medicare Contribution by supporting unionization efforts and negotiating with workers to provide better wages and benefits – reducing costs and promoting collective bargaining at the same time.

Because my plan holds health care cost growth to GDP levels, businesses will have stable balance sheets that grow with the economy instead of crowding out other priorities.

And it continues on and on but I'm not going to post the entire plan here--but it's extensive, so read it yourself. This addresses a lot of the concerns that have been raised about her plan.

[Heebie Jeebie]

https://mobile.twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1190257821721538561

[GP270watch]

 This is what America needs. I'd like to see "Medicare for All" be in the official Democratic Party Platform.

 Warren needs to be elected president. She doesn't just talk about these things, she's planning how we can achieve these things and delivering a message that's catching on.

 M4All is the leading healthcare choice of Americans over expanding the ACA, current system, or "state plans". It beats those other options and support is expanding.

[Heebie Jeebie]

https://mobile.twitter.com/jbarro/status/1190252790070890496

[GP270watch]

 Her plan even throws in immigration reform, taxing offshore profits, and decreasing military spending.
If you present this to the American people saying we're going to fix immigration, tax American companies that offshore jobs, and spend money at home and not oversees with the military I believe people will buy into that. This is a very populist message that I am sure will be savaged by the corporate media, private insurance lobby, defense contractors, and Wall Street.

 You have to ask yourself why Americans don't have the guaranteed healthcare rights that all other industrialized nations have?

[Gass3268]

Stuff like this is why I suppport Warren over Sanders. Bernie does a great job at identifying the problem and having a general idea of how to fix it. Warren dives into the details and throughly explains how we are going to fix our issues.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Her plan even throws in immigration reform, taxing offshore profits, and decreasing military spending.
If you present this to the American people saying we're going to fix immigration, tax American companies that offshore jobs, and spend money at home and not oversees with the military I believe people will buy into that. This is a very populist message that I am sure will be savaged by the corporate media, private insurance lobby, defense contractors, and Wall Street.

 You have to ask yourself why Americans don't have the guaranteed healthcare rights that all other industrialized nations have?

https://mobile.twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1190263050873528325

I have to admit, I was deeply skeptical of Medicare-for-all, and I'm still reading the initial response to this plan, but so far I'm very very impressed. Warren has been able to do what Sanders hasn't for the last four years.

[Cinemark]

This is what a primary is for. Warren is a stronger candidate with a fleshed out Medicare for all plan and she wouldn't have had that if she hadn't been attacked from the center. .

[Dr. Arch]

Warren continues to impress.

[YE]

And Warren just took away a GOP talking point.

[Shadows]

I can't believe people are praising this. This is probably the worst plan so far received in this cycle & has gigantic holes in it. It totally busts the myth that Warren is serious about her plans & shows she is not a serious policy candidate.

Elizabeth Warren’s plan to pay for Medicare-for-all, explained

Private insurers spend about 12.2 percent on administrative costs and profits. Urban assumes that would fall to 6 percent under single-payer, as that’s what Medicare spends now. Warren assumes it will fall to 2.3 percent. Urban assumed that single-payer would pay physicians at Medicare rates but hospitals at 115 percent of Medicare’s rates. Warren takes hospitals down to 110 percent, saving $600 billion. . These are efforts to move health care away from fee-for-service, but the assumptions here are optimistic. Warren’s team projects $1.2 trillion in savings from bundled payments, for instance, but its footnote refers to a Congressional Budget Office paper from before the program began in earnest. A 2018 Commonwealth study found no savings from bundled payments, and Medicare has been backing off the program in recent years.

https://www.vox.com/2019/11/1/20942587/elizabeth-warren-medicare-for-all-taxes-explained

20T$  of Warren's money is -

Money saved through Immigration Reform.
Money through IRS Compliance
Money from Defense Budget Cuts
Much Lower Medicare Reimbursement rates than possible
Absurdly low unrealistic Healthcare Inflation
Irrational Administration cost (4% lesser than estimate after factoring in savings)
Non-existent savings shown (Bundled Payments)
70% Cut in Drug Prices (Her Own research team assumes 30% Cut)

This is the Donald Trump plan "Mexico will pay for the Wall" Policy !

[Shadows]

Elizabeth Warren released her Medicare for All financing plan today. The proposal is as follows:

Independent contractors (and the companies who hire them) will also be exempt from the Employer Medicare contribution both initially and forever.


What Warren is proposing here, in ordinary fiscal language, is a Medicare Head Tax. This is a departure from the normal Medicare Payroll Tax proposals. The distributive difference between them is that the Medicare Payroll Tax charges a specific percentage of each worker’s earnings, while the Medicare Head Tax charges a specific dollar amount per worker. Needless to say, the Medicare Payroll Tax is far superior to the Medicare Head Tax distributively speaking. Specifically, the Medicare Head Tax charges middle and low earners massively more than the Medicare Payroll Tax does.

https://www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2019/11/01/warrens-perpetual-medicare-head-tax-is-unworkable-and-bad/

I guess the only person apart from Trump who can sell non-sensical policy proposals as serious atleast to the party base is Warren. Her College-plan was disastrous & there is no criticism of that plan.

Now her Medicare-for-all plan is possible the worst plan in 2020 & is a "Mexico will pay for the Wall" Trump type plan & people are praising this. This is a Kamala "Ban Trump from Twitter" type plan.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

https://www.vox.com/2019/11/1/20942587/elizabeth-warren-medicare-for-all-taxes-explained

There’s wide variation in the quality of insurance employers purchase, and this plan has the consequence, at the outset, of punishing employers who purchased better insurance for their employees — now they’re paying more than stingier competitors, but without any recruiting benefit. Over time, Warren says she’ll adjust all employers to the same level, though the details of how that will work are sparse.

There’s an even worse inequity for employers with fewer than 50 employees. They’re not required under law to provide health insurance, but a bit over half do. Warren’s plan says that small businesses “would be exempt from the Employer Medicare Contribution unless they are already paying for employee health care today.” That’s a fairly direct penalty to small businesses that offer health insurance today: They have to keep paying a cost their competitors have dodged, but paying that cost no longer gives them an advantage in hiring.

what a ridiculous failure of a plan

[Shadows]

https://www.vox.com/2019/11/1/20942587/elizabeth-warren-medicare-for-all-taxes-explained

There’s wide variation in the quality of insurance employers purchase, and this plan has the consequence, at the outset, of punishing employers who purchased better insurance for their employees — now they’re paying more than stingier competitors, but without any recruiting benefit. Over time, Warren says she’ll adjust all employers to the same level, though the details of how that will work are sparse.

There’s an even worse inequity for employers with fewer than 50 employees. They’re not required under law to provide health insurance, but a bit over half do. Warren’s plan says that small businesses “would be exempt from the Employer Medicare Contribution unless they are already paying for employee health care today.” That’s a fairly direct penalty to small businesses that offer health insurance today: They have to keep paying a cost their competitors have dodged, but paying that cost no longer gives them an advantage in hiring.

what a ridiculous failure of a plan

Sanders' plan proposed 30T$ Funding while Warren's plan proposed 20T$ leaving a 10T$ hole which is based on ridiculously low Health Inflation, 80% Drug Price cuts, more lower reimbursement rates & administrative costs than possible.

Also her plans of funding including IRS Compliance, Immigration Reform, Defense Spending Cuts & unrealistic figures from her Wealth Tax (Compare the Wealth Tax implemented in any country. No Country has generated the amount of wealth projected).

There is NO TRANSITION Period proposed & the plan is proposed as a "Long Term Medicare Plan". She also has to find out per employee healthcare cost of every single corporation & charge them 98% of that. Brilliantly workable plan. Similar to her absurd Tuition Free College plan which had 100 Income Criterias & Slabs which are not workable.

She will propose complex plans & people are so stupid they will think just because it is so complex that it a brilliant plan.

[Heebie Jeebie]

Many of the pay-for ideas in this plan are too optimistic or are downright bad (a 35% minimum tax on foreign profits of US firms?  Come on.).  But, the key is she directly captures the exact current spending of state & local governments and private employers — which guarantees that every payer’s costs go down.  With that done, the rest of the burden of adjustment falls on providers and rich people.  Realistically, this vision would lead to a somewhat higher deficit rather than a number of these offsets fully materializing.  Which is fine!  Once you have a framework like this in place the details can be haggled over.