Maybe I wasn’t as clear as I thought. What I said was that the individual pays 8,000 AND the employer pays an additional 15,000.

Thanks for your clarification on the payroll tax. As you see, the savings on the 15,000 would still be greater than the tax.

And I don’t know what you mean about cities and towns not being affected. Insurance payments for employees and retirees are one of the biggest issues facing municipal governments. I’ve negotiated several municipal contracts. From the government side, we would have been ecstatic to have been able to let go of those payments. From the employee side, we would have loved to have been able to ask for a wage increase; given that the insurance premiums meant that we had to accept lower wages, you can see that as employees we were being asked to pay twice.

Government funded health insurance would save money. The US pays vastly more for our care than any other nation on earth. And it isn’t because our system produces better outcomes.