Robert,

I am assuming that you are providing health care coverage for your employees through insurance companies. If you no longer had to fund these insurance premiums...would that not free up funds for a national healthcare system. By employer paid program I am further assuming that you are talking about the employer contribution to the medicare tax which shows up on a W-2 form for employees.  I don't know what you are paying, but in my case my payment to medicare tax is .029 % as someone who is self employed. My wife pays half that amount as an employed individual with her employer contributing the other half. If that is in fact what you are talking about ...the contribution (Medicare Tax) I would pay would be substantially less than I now pay for health insurance premiums.

Welfare really does not solve the problem. The rich can afford good health care coverage. The poor have coverage through welfare. Self employed independent contractors are mostly going to fall in between as members of the middle class. It is the middle class that needs reform of the system.

I do agree that we will probably be hearing a lot of campaign rhetoric in the months to come. Possibly after elected ...the candidate will foget it all until the next election, or possibly not be able to get it through congress. I was listening to Hillary Clinton the other night. She indicated that she had been working for it for 15 years. That is a lot of time with nothing to show for it. I remember the election in l992, and how the matter faded into oblivion afterward. Really can not see that she has done much in the Senate to advance the position.