Medicare for Me

A lot of people dread turning 65, but not me. Ever since a cancer diagnosis in 2012, there’s nothing I’d rather do than tick off the years toward old age. I’ve eagerly awaited certain milestones:

  1. 60 for most senior discounts at the movies
  2. 62 for the lifetime pass to National Parks (I lucked in at the $10 rate just before it increased to $80—still a steal!)
  3. 65 for Medicare
  4. 66 and two-thirds for collecting 100% of my Social Security.

This month, I achieve Milestone #3, and I couldn’t be happier. Not just because it means I’m still alive and well, but because of the hundreds of dollars I’ll save every month for the same insurance and doctors I have now.

Don’t get me wrong—as a self-employed cancer survivor, I was thrilled when the Affordable Care Act passed, and pre-existing conditions could no longer be used as an excuse to deny people coverage. I was lucky enough to have good coverage pre-ACA through my husband’s employer. But my husband felt he couldn’t leave no matter how unhappy he became as the job grew more stressful. Employer-provided health insurance, which we were fortunate to have, equaled golden handcuffs. The ACA changed all that. My husband, also a cancer survivor, was thrilled to join me in the ranks of the happily self-employed.

We paid through the nose to keep our good coverage through Covered California, and it was a privilege to do so (in all senses of the word).

Still, as great an accomplishment as the ACA is, it highlights the problems in our for-profit healthcare industry. It’s why single-payer, universal coverage, the public option, and Medicare for All are so front and center in the 2020 campaign. Democrats have varied but serious proposals about how best to improve healthcare, while Republicans continue to sabotage an imperfect but substantial reform, even threatening to eliminate the ban on pre-existing conditions altogether and putting healthcare out of reach for tens of millions of Americans.

Medicare for All has always struck me as a way to borrow a catchy name and a popular program as an umbrella description of our aspirations for universal coverage. There are different ways to skin this cat. My personal preference is to initially lower the age at which Medicare eligibility starts (a proposal that Senator Joe Lieberman thwarted in 2009), funnel much younger people dropped from their parents’ coverage into it, and allow an opt-in for everybody by expanding the public option—essentially the glide path described by many Democrats to achieve Medicare for All. I understand the appeal and economic rationale of a rapid and far-reaching overhaul, but a more gradual transition avoids the risk for major implementation glitches and has far more buy-in from voters.

Which brings me back to Medicare for Me, my “OK, Boomer” achievement that moves me higher up the ladder on which I was already born—a ladder whose bottom rung swings far beyond the reach of so many.  I am glad to have reached this milestone, which makes my life easier and more affordable. I will be gladder still when Medicare for Me becomes Medicare for All.