The way forward on health care

Medicaid expansion, bring back the public option, and dismantle regulatory barriers to health supply

After being a bit provocative in Tuesday’s post by saying the U.S. health care system has some unappreciated virtues, I want to loop back to my very normal lib opinion that the enormous number of uninsured people in the United States is a huge problem.

Indeed, I think Democrats have erred by placing less emphasis on this issue after saving the Affordable Care Act, a big political success for them in the 2018 election cycle. Polling from Gallup shows that a substantial majority of Americans believe that making sure everyone has health insurance should be the government’s responsibility, and Democrats have a consistent trust edge on health care. It’s bad when the health care conversation gets hijacked by activists demanding Democrats run on a Medicare for All platform, because giant tax increases and big changes to the status quo scare voters. But Democrats shouldn’t abandon the issue. The high-level M4A pitch that “health care should be a right” polls well as an abstraction, and the tr…