A new billionaire-backed think tank is trying to divert momentum away from Medicare for All and into a package of reforms that will not come anywhere close to solving the problems of our for-profit health care system.
The Searchlight Institute was founded to fight back against the progressive movement and push out-of-touch, centrist policies.
They recently released their “Making Health Care More Available” plan with the shiny promise of free primary care and very little under the surface. The People’s Policy Project outlines just how badly this “alternative” falls short of Medicare for All — let us break it down for you.
Free primary care for all sounds good on paper, but it would only cover up to 1.8% of total out-of-pocket health care spending at most — drops in the bucket compared to what we need.1
Another proposal of theirs is to restore Biden-era ACA subsidies, but only in states that have expanded Medicaid. That only covers 2.4% of the U.S. population and leaves millions of people in ten states with higher prices than everyone else.2
People’s Policy Project summarized this package perfectly:
“[The Searchlight plan] is clearly inferior to a Medicare for All type system on all the relevant policy axes. The point of this proposal seems to have been to generate a flashy headline about free primary care for all, which it did, but that headline policy amounts to almost nothing and the overall grab bag of proposals is internally contradictory, cruel in places, and simply not up to the task at hand.”
Searchlight would rather nibble around the edges than fight for true systemic reform that would guarantee health care for everyone. Their goal is to stifle the popular demand for Medicare for All and maintain the status quo in Washington by pushing half-measures that won't fully solve our deeply broken system.
Instead of several small fixes that could be stymied at every turn, we’re demanding the whole thing: Medicare for All and nothing less!
If you’re with us, help us pack U.S. Senators’ town halls during their August recess and voice your demand for Medicare for All. Sign up to let us know you’re interested in attending a town hall in your state (should one be scheduled), and you’ll receive our short guide with all the information you need to find events near you, what to do if you attend, and more.
Let’s make it absolutely clear to every senator that their constituents want and deserve Medicare for All — not some half-baked alternative.
In solidarity,
Nurses’ Campaign to Win Medicare for All
Sources:
1 - People’s Policy Project
2 - Ibid
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