Abstract

KIE: The author proposes a program for the expansion of access to medical care which realistically reflects the public belief that everyone has a right to adequate health care and the assumption that the individual taxpayer should not have to pay more than $50 per year to see this happen: scrap Medicaid and create a new initiative, administered through state health departments, to subsidize private health insurance policies; require basic private health insurance coverage for all full-time (including temporary) employees; and tax the individual between $50 and $65 to insure those not in the workplace full-time. This plan offers the promise of achieving bipartisan support by relying on private health insurance linked to employment and the removal of disincentives for seeking work among the poor.