That’s my point… do not expect a legislative supermajority in the near future. Accomplish what you can with the legislature you have. Hold off on the big stuff until you can back it up in the legislature (it could be a while).
I don’t know that I’d call it absurd, so much as repeating the mistake of the ACA debate by making promises that can’t possibly be kept.
As for Bernie’s Congress problem, I think Sanders is perfectly willing to govern as someone who doesn’t expect to win the same way he’s campaigning as someone who doesn’t expect to win. Best case, he does actually move the Overton Window and gets a lot of things done, worst case, he concentrates on being a pretty good President as he was a pretty good mayor of Burlington. Fix the potholes. Bernie Sanders, like the Clintons, knows that one way to move the Overton Window left is to restore trust in government. If Bernie Sanders does nothing else other than make sure that the government agencies run better under his watch than they did under Bush and Obama’s, I think he’ll walk away from the Presidency satisfied.
Besides, if the end result of a Sanders Presidency is an efficient, smaller government and a balanced budget, his fellow socialists can say, “See! Socialism works!” even though nothing approaching socialism actually occurred under the Sanders administration due to the Republican Congress.
Vox continues to be a DLC/Very Serious People shill publication.
Perhaps, but their points are spot on. Ezra Klein has studied health care systems all over the world, and their ability to keep costs down does in fact come from the power to say “No”. Bernie promises that the answer will always be “Yes”, which is absurd.
Ezra also makes the valid point that health care systems are never funded on taxes on the rich, but instead on efficient, broad based taxes such as VATs or payroll taxes. Funding it the way Sanders does would probably fail. It’s not as if Sweden or France never thought, “Hey, wouldn’t it be nice if we could just tax the rich and give everyone free health care?” Sanders acts as if no one ever thought of this before.
I was being somewhat ironic but yeah I do agree on that point. For a variety of reasons I prefer something along the German model over single-payer for that reason and which is why I strongly support a form of VAT in this country.
You would be surprised at how many republicans are blue collar class people who are tired of being screwed over by the system and would welcome many of Sanders ideas. Really he is the only candidate talking about going after CEO salaries and companies moving profits off shore so they dont pay taxes.
The problem with that is that most countries don’t tax offshore income. The reason: It poaches other countries’ tax bases. Would do very little for the US’ reputation for us to be going around taking tax revenue away from our allies. Profits made in Britain, France, China, Japan, etc, belong to those countries. That is not our money to tax.
Promises to tax offshore income are about as plausible as making the Mexicans pay for a wall. Except the Mexicans can just say “no.” Forcibly stealing money from our allies is a just a wee bit more provocative.
What are you smoking? The US already does tax offshore income of US companies and individuals. That’s why some of them pull the shenanigan of a “tax inversion”, where they create a parent company in a foreign country so they are no longer technically a US company. For example, Apple and Pfizer have technically become Irish companies because they have a shell operation there. This is absurd and ought to be illegal.
Sorry, I got my facts twisted. The US does tax offshore income, as well as expats’ income, but the company has to be American. And I’m not sure how you correct that problem, since it was caused by a stupid policy to begin with, without taxing companies like Toyota on Japanese earnings.
The correct thing to do is to get the two thirds of corporations that pay no taxes at all to start paying, then you don’t need to get foreign earnings from the one third of companies that do. And that’s what makes Sanders’ proposal even dumber. He’s basically attacking the companies that do pay taxes and saying “We’re gonna get you to pay even more!” while still giving the companies that don’t pay taxes a pass.
As Vox further pointed out today, all of Sanders’ plans are half baked, and he needs to start taking his own campaign more seriously now, because he has a chance to win. If he doesn’t, Clinton is going to start tearing these plans apart and making Sanders look like a not so serious candidate.
Vox takes a look at the tax rates if Sanders was to get everything he asked for:
Funny little detail, probably unintentional on Bernie’s part, his taxes are actually a little regressive until you get past $250,000, where sharp progressivity kicks in. Those making $18,550 though would actually pay a higher tax rate than those making $118,500.
But taxes for all would be pretty steep: 34.1% for the poorest taxpayers, 40-49.1% for the middle class, and 62% for the rich.
Actually, scratch that, his regressiveness is intentional, since he includes a “donut hole” for the payroll tax between $118,500 and $250,000. The effect of this is to raise taxes on those making under $118K, but to shield people making between $118K and $250K from big tax increases.
But I guess since his base of support is those very voters, mainly in the NE and California, shielding them from tax increases makes sense politically.
Note that his percentages include both the employee and employer’s portion of payroll taxes, so the numbers are not quite as eye-popping as they seem. Although the super-rich would be paying as much as 77%
Yes, but the employer tax is an employee tax, it’s just a way for the government to convince the economically illiterate that they aren’t paying as much.
Both sides of the payroll tax are 100% paid for by the employee. Half in direct taxes, half in lost wages.
That’s only true in positions where there is no competition for employees. For skilled positions or those demanding a lot of experience, the employer has to pay the going rate. Same with benefits; no prospective employee will be convinced he should work for less because benefits impose a cost to the employer; it is a cost of doing business.
I was not making any comment on that. My point is that someone who is currently in the 15% or 25% tax bracket might think their taxes would go up to 40 - 49% based on your post. In fact they are already paying 30.3% or 40.3% when calculated the same way.
Is it so very very hard to remember that in Sanders’ plan every American’s health insurance premium goes to Zero – zilch, nada?
Quoting scary tax rates while ignoring the benefits gained (e.g. Zero Healthcare cost) is very … Republican of you. 
The problem with that is ACA. For a lot of Americans, ACA actually does come tax and cost free. So you’re raising their taxes to replace low or non-existent premiums.
Someone paying $100/month for a silver plan is not going to be happy paying $200/month more in taxes for a single payer plan. Especially since most ACA plans offer better coverage than Medicare, the program Sanders says single payer will be based on(although that’s probably just branding, since Medicare also charges premiums).
I’m sorry that I forgot to connect Every.Single.Dot for you. With employers no longer under any obligation to provide health coverage, wages and salaries will rise.
HTH.
If your employer provides health insurance. If not, and you get your health insurance from the exchanges, heavily subsidized, then you are a net loser under Sanders’ plan. This will also be true of employed Medicaid recipients, who currently pay pretty much nothing but will have to pay for Sanders’ single payer plan.
Of course, we’re talking about a plan that is about as serious as the Republican alternative to ACA. We actually have no idea what Bernie Sanders means when he says “Single payer”. No premiums and no denials of care will cost a lot more than he says it will. Not that any such system actually exists, because such a system is completely impossible.
Aren’t those people on Medicaid? In that income bracket, how much would their taxes go up? Now compare that against everyone else, not just those on ACA, who would not have any healthcare premiums or spending at all. The math is not that difficult.
The huge confusions about health care costs would be reduced if people could grasp that money goes in and comes out. It doesn’t disappear.
Whether health care is paid by employers, patients, insurance companies or government, the money paid in will be spent out on healthcare and red-tape. In a single-payer system like Britain’s, red tape is eliminated. Hint: getting insurance companies and their bureaucracies out of the loop is a good thing.
Now, something that is true is that healthy people will end up subsidizing sick people; and rich people will subsidize poor people. Only in America would that be considered a bad thing.
HTH.