Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders admitted Tuesday that Health Care for All will mean more taxes for most.
“What we have chosen not to do … is to tell you how I’m going to raise every nickel in a $3.5 trillion budget,” the Democratic presidential candidate said as he answered questions at a town hall in Manchester, New Hampshire. “That’s something that is going to have to be discussed. So I wanted to lay out the program as to what it would mean and to tell you that it will cost you and ordinary Americans a lot less than you are current spending [on heath care] on average.” (RELATED: ‘Medicare For All’ Price Tag ‘A Little Scary,’ Says New Campaign Chairwoman For Congressional Democrats)
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders says his government-run health care system will require tax increases pic.twitter.com/W7BMG3lxiH
— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) May 28, 2019
US Senator Elizabeth Warren (C), Democrat from Massachusetts, speaks with US Senator Bernie Sanders (2nd R), Independent from Vermont, as they discusses Medicare for All legislation Photo: JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)
Sanders guessed that the money to pay for universal medicare will “probably end up looking like a payroll tax on employers and increase in income taxes in a progressive way” that the senator insisted would result in a “significant deductible” for “ordinary people.” He said low-income people “will pay nothing for it” while “upper income people will pay more.”
Sanders told the crowd, “Admittedly, this is a complicated issue — we’ve been wrestling with it for years.” (RELATED: Mitch McConnell Tells AHA That ‘Far Left’ Medicare For All’ Is ‘Serious Bad News’)
The self-described Democratic socialist and many Democrats are advocating for “Medicare for All.” Sanders has said that he particularly admires the universal health care system of Canada, because it is so “innovative.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) speaks during a Stop ‘Trumpcare’ rally May 4, 2017 in front of the Capitol in Washington, DC. Congressional Democrats joined activists for a rally to urge not to replace Obamacare, also known as the Affordable Care Act. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Sanders does not talk about the well-known problems with Canadian medicare, such as lengthy wait times for a variety of operations from the simple to the complex or recently released data from the Fraser Institute revealing that 63,000 Canadians left the country in 2017 to seek medical treatment that they could not obtain at all or in a timely manner within their own country. The majority of them reportedly went to the U.S. for surgery or other operations.
The conservative think tank also reported that the average Canadian family spends more than $12,000 in taxes on government-funded health care.
