During a campaign event in Iowa on Friday, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden discussed the details of his health care plan, the Washington Examiner reports.
An interesting exchange between the former vice president and a member of the crowd took place.
During his stump speech, Biden criticized fellow presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ signature proposal, Medicare for All. Unlike Biden, who wants to preserve and expand the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, Sanders is an advocate of universal, single-payer health care system.
According to the former vice president, Sanders’ proposal is unrealistic and too expensive.
During his speech, Biden made the claim that his health care plan “costs a lot of money — $740 billion over 10 years,” while Sanders’ plan would cost “30 to 40 trillion dollars — trillion dollars — over the next 10 years.”
An attendee later criticized Biden’s plan, pointing out that it would help health insurance companies profit. Biden disputed the person’s claims, arguing that the insurance industry is actually opposed to his plan.
“The insurance companies are strongly against my plan. They were against Obamacare,” he said, adding that Sanders’ plan would actually give “multi-billion-dollar breaks” to employers.
The attendee responded by arguing that employers would pay more taxes under a Sanders presidency, therefore helping finance Sanders’ system.
The former vice president replied by suggesting that the potential voter votes for Sanders instead.
“Well, God love you. You got the right candidate in Bernie.”
“And Elizabeth, or whomever you have,” he added, referring to Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren, who has also signaled support for Medicare for All.
This is not the first time for the former vice president to criticize Sanders’ signature policy proposal, but his criticism is misleading, according to The Week .
Bernie Sanders: “We are spending twice as much per capita on health care as the Canadians or any other major country on earth.”
Joe Biden: “This is America.”
“Yeah, but Americans don’t want to pay twice as much as other countries.” https://t.co/INdRXlIwFs #DemDebate pic.twitter.com/hrYzxLgXiC
— ABC News (@ABC) September 13, 2019
The publication pointed out that Biden’s argument that Medicare for All would cost more simply does not hold water, since studies have shown that it would actually reduce total health care spending over the next 10 years by as much as $2 trillion.
Sanders’ plan would abolish out of pocket payments, co-pays, and deductibles, and cover every American.
Biden also told the attendee that the health insurance industry is opposed to his plan, but according to Vox , that is not true.
In an April report, the publication wrote that the health care industry is uniting behind Biden, and “betting” on his candidacy in a war against Medicare for All.
“The insurers would much rather have Biden than Warren, Sanders, or a couple of others,” a health care industry lobbyist explained.
As previously reported by The Inquisitr , Biden remains the clear Democratic front-runner, even though both Sanders and Warren have experienced a surge in the polls.
