Las Vegas Debate Takeaway: The Roads Have Different Names, But They All Lead to Socialized Medicine

The more voters know about price controls and socialized medicine, there more they oppose them. For example, our recent poll found that 65 percent of New Hampshire voters reject Bernie Sanders’ Medicare for All plan. Knowing this, candidates on the left have adopted softer-sounding proposals that ultimately lead to the same result: full-scale socialized medicine.

Candidates on the left continue to push heavy-handed, big government health care takeovers – whether they call them Medicare for All, Medicare for All Who Want It, of the “public option” – that would all ultimately lead to socialized medicine, whether immediately in the case of Medicare for All, or incrementally.

Voters must not be fooled. A “public option” is merely a trojan horse to a government-run, Medicare for All system. As the Pacific Research Institute’s Sally Pipes correctly points out in her recent op-ed, “the public option is little more than a stay of execution for private coverage. In due time, private insurance would vanish.” Mayor Pete suggests this plan would force private insurers to stay competitive by lowering rates. But government need not worry about remaining “in the black” as private industry does. It can simply underbid private insurers, operate at a loss, and force taxpayers to shoulder the burden. Eventually, the “competition” from the price-distorted government option would crowd out private insurance entirely, leaving government insurance – socialized medicine – as the sole option for Americans.

Socialized medicine would be absolutely devastating to our country. It would mean the elimination of private insurance, the loss of millions of middle-class jobs, huge tax increases, reduced access to care, and innovation-crushing price controls. We can only hope voters aren’t falling into the left’s rhetorical traps.