By Samuel Strait – Reporter at Large – February 5, 2022

Progressive Lefty’s have been spewing the mantra “Health Care Is A Human
Right” for decades.  Well it is a “human right” for each individual to
take care of their personal health care on their own.  AB 1400 is the
latest Progressive push to destroy California by establishing a single
payer state government controlled health care system.  The Bill would
have abolished all private and employer sponsored health insurance.  It
would have promised universal coverage for all the state’s citizens, and
include coverage for illegal immigrants.  What a prize package.

As per usual from the State’s nincompoops in Sacramento, it promises to
set and control payments for doctors, payments to all other medical
professionals, and restricts resident’s  ability to receive health care
from outside the State’s system.  It does not even penetrate the tiny
minds of those who have proposed such lunacy that doctors and medical
professionals have the ability to simply move to another state and take
up their practices unrestricted.  It also doesn’t take into account that
most medical professionals that provide high quality care would likely
be those relocating, leaving for the most part the quacks and charlatans
to fill the void.

We may all breath a sight of relief, as even moderate Democrats couldn’t
muster the courage to vote in favor of such economic suicide.  In the
Democrat dominated State Assembly a vote was found to lack the necessary
numbers to pass the Bill and for now has been relegated to the scrap
heap where it should stay permanently.  In addition to the opposition
from more normal Democrats, the insurance industry, and the business
community, Governor “Empty Suit”, a huge supporter prior to election in
2018, was noticeably missing from the cheering section.  Looks like Hair
Gel just lost some important supporters for the next election cycle.

This is about the umteenth time single payer has reared its ugly head
and each time the fatal flaw is exposed when the question is asked, how
are we going to pay for it.  Just to get an idea of what the State would
have to pony up for each year of existence going forward, try
$400,000,000,000.  Advocates claim that the federal government could be
cajoled into coughing up half of it. Oh really!  And cost savings
because the “government is in charge” would further reduce the total. 
Unfortunately for the sponsors, that didn’t fly either. After all when
has the government ever run anything that the cost didn’t end far more
than projected.

When you consider the fact that the Governor just released his
anticipated budget for next fiscal year and it rang in at
$288,000,000,000 for every State funded program.  The price tag for
single payer at $400,000,000,000 looks like tax increase time in a large
way.  The State currently rakes in about $170,000,000,000 from various
tax programs and makes up the remainder from a collection of sources,
one of which is the Federal Government.  So, in the feverish unbalance
minds of the proponents of AB 1400 the Feds were going to have to be
convinced that an additional $200,000,000,000 was possible.  Yah, Right.
The additional sums would more likely have come from upwards of a 20%
tax increase, half on the employee and the remainder from the employer. 
Can it be said, STICKER SHOCK.

It is not as if the State’s progressives do not have any avenue to look
at the couple of other aborted attempts to do the same thing on a
smaller scale.  Try Vermont, which passed a single payer health care
plan only to find the funding was impossible to obtain.  Colorado in
2015 proposed a similar plan that ended when state voters rejected the
plan by more than three out of four voters saying “no”.  If any one in
this State has the idea that single payer health care will be
economically feasible, think high speed rail which started at $30
Billion, now is looking like $100 Billion and counting.  For those that
think single payer in Europe has been a rousing success, there is a
bridge in Brooklyn for sale, cheap!  The bottom line is that any single
payer health care system run by government is unlikely to be successful. 
Heaven help those state’s that try…..