(C) Common Dreams
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About 7 in 10 Voters Favor a Public Health Insurance Option. Medicare for All Remains Polarizing [1]
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Date: 2021-03-24
Overall support for Medicare for All has remained flat since 2020, but support for the public option rose 5 percentage points.
55% of voters support Medicare for All, while 32%, including 62% of Republicans, oppose the single-payer plan.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), pictured July 29, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., reintroduced a Medicare for All bill last week. A new Morning Consult/Politico poll found that 55 percent of voters support Medicare for All, an unchanged level of support compared to a year ago. (Graeme Jennings/Getty Images)
As congressional Democrats weigh how far to go to expand health coverage, a new survey indicates more than half of voters are in favor of either a “Medicare for All” single-payer plan or a public health insurance option — but they largely prefer the latter. Overall, 55 percent of voters said they support Medicare for All, according to the Morning Consult/Politico survey, a level that is unchanged from the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020. Partisan divides around Medicare for All remain stark, though: 79 percent of Democrats and 28 percent of Republicans support the single-payer proposal. Another 32 percent of voters, including 62 percent of Republicans, oppose it.
“The pandemic has exposed all of the holes in our existing health care safety net and how fragile our employer-based system is, but it doesn’t seem to be that the higher level of awareness is translating into support for Medicare for All,” said Sabrina Corlette, a research professor and co-director of the Center on Health Insurance Reforms at Georgetown University. Democratic voters were about equally supportive of Medicare for All, a single-payer system where everyone would get their health insurance from the government, and a public option that would allow people to buy health coverage either from a government-run program or from private insurers. Republicans, however, were more likely to favor a public option: 56 percent said they support such a plan and 32 percent said they oppose it. Overall, 68 percent of voters said they support a public option, up from 63 percent in February 2020, while 18 percent oppose it. Democrats and Republicans have both reported upticks in support since last year. Even so, “I definitely would not take this as a sign that it’s going to be smooth sailing” to enact a public option, Corlette said. The findings come as congressional Democrats offer dueling legislation to expand public health insurance, amid ongoing opposition from Republicans and industry players. Last week, a group of more than 100 House Democrats led by Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington reintroduced a Medicare for All bill, picking up notable cosponsors like New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone, chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Other lawmakers, including Democratic Sens. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Michael Bennet of Colorado, have proposed a public health insurance option, a more measured approach that President Joe Biden supported during his campaign.
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[1] Url:
https://morningconsult.com/2021/03/24/medicare-for-all-public-option-polling/
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