The health-insurance industry is working to pull Democrats away from Medicare-for-all. An audio recording from a health insurer's employee town hall reveals its strategy.
At a recent private event with employees, an executive at UnitedHealth Group said,"The last thing you want to do is become the poster child during the presidential campaign." By Jeff Stein Jeff Stein Economic policy reporter Email Bio Follow April 12 at 6:00 AM At a company town hall meeting in late February, a UnitedHealthcare executive assured employees that the private health insurance giant was indeed working to undercut support for Democratic lawmakers’ push for Medicare-for-all.
Congressional Democrats, including some of the party’s leading 2020 presidential contenders, are pushing proposals that would establish a single-payer health-care system in which all Americans would receive government insurance. Legislation in both the House and the Senate would outlaw coverage that is duplicative with generous government plans, reducing the multibillion-dollar health insurance industry to a small, supplemental role.
These private insurers have pushed for Democrats to instead focus on repairing the Affordable Care Act passed under President Barack Obama, arguing a more incremental approach could include extending health insurance to all Americans without requiring a radical transformation of existing markets. In the February meeting with employees, Nelson said the company opposes Medicare-for-all because it excludes the private sector, which he said does a better job of delivering health care than the government, and said he doubted how a single-payer system could be funded or effectively administered.
AHIP last summer also joined with insurers such as Blue Cross Blue Shield, as well as hospital associations and pharmaceutical companies, in forming a group called the Partnership for America’s Health Care. In February, the partnership — whose members spent $143 million on lobbying in 2018 — said it would begin a six-figure digital advertising campaign to oppose both Medicare-for-all and a public option that would allow Americans to buy into Medicare.
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