"America cannot afford to ignore the growing number of people without health insurance coverage. As policy makers debate potential solutions, they will find this volume and the previous one enormously helpful. Some of the country's most thoughtful health analysts have described clearly and concisely a wide variety of alternative approaches to comprehensive health care. The ingredients for informed debate and decision-making are brought together here."

-Alice Rivlin, Senior Fellow and Johnson Chair, Brookings Institution

"For too long, it has been politically unacceptable to propose any type of comprehensive reform that would provide coverage to the millions of Americans without health insurance. By soliciting new ideas across the full spectrum of thinking, we have collected a range of proposals that suit many different philosophies. We don't endorse any specific approach, but applaud the authors' courage to talk about big ideas once again."

-Jack A. Meyer, President, Economic and Social Research Institute

As policy discussions turn to uninsured, ESRI compiles diverse range of comprehensive proposals

Covering America: Real Remedies for the Uninsured, Volume 2, provides a new set of plans for comprehensive coverage expansion

To view or download the document or a summary from our website, click here. The website also indicates how to order a hardcopy of the book.

After a long lull in the debate over comprehensive proposals that would substantially increase health insurance coverage in the U.S., the topic is slowly resurfacing in national policy conversations. To help enhance the discussion, a new publication from the Economic and Social Research Institute offers three contrasting blueprints for solving the problem of the uninsured. Covering America: Real Remedies for the Uninsured, Volume 2, contains three new proposals from distinguished health analysts who outline policy options for broadly extending health insurance coverage.

David B. Kendall, Jeff Lemieux, and S. Robert Levine, of the Progressive Policy Institute, offer an option that builds on the present system, but provides substantial tax credits to make coverage more affordable.

Tom Miller, of the Cato Institute, proposes a reformed system that would promote efficiency and economy by redesigning market incentives, especially for individual consumers, as well as using tax credits and an expanded safety net to remove financial barriers to getting care.

James A. Morone, of Brown University, advocates a "single payer" system that would extend the Medicare system, with improved benefits, to all Americans.

The proposals join ten others published last year to offer diverse and innovative ideas for enhancing discussions about comprehensive health care coverage for all Americans. The new volume also includes three commentaries by distinguished observers of the health system about the challenges of achieving major coverage expansions and how they can be addressed. The commentary authors are Christine Ferguson, Patricia Riley, Sara Rosenbaum, Edward F. Lawlor, Ann Dude, and Bruce C. Vladeck.

Covering America

Covering America promotes serious consideration of a diverse range of comprehensive proposals to provide affordable health coverage for millions of uninsured Americans.

The Covering America project is coordinated by the Economic and Social Research Institute, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research institute in Washington, D.C., and is made possible by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Princeton, New Jersey. The Foundation does not endorse the findings of this or other independent projects.

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