Bernie Sanders Overview – 725 Delegates

Most people are already familiar with Sanders, but as a close second in the race, it’s important to review him and his policies. Sanders’ big platform is universal healthcare, advocating a public system to replace the private healthcare system America currently has. His plan would include healthcare, dental, eyeglasses, hearing aids, and more. The most obvious and immediate question to ask about this system though is how Sanders plans to pay for it. Because people as well as companies who provide health insurance would no longer pay healthcare premiums, Sanders’ plan is to redirect the money that would be spent on the premiums to the government in the form of taxes. He also plans on raising taxes on large businesses and people with high incomes. Despite his plan, it is important to remember that this change would be large and incredibly complex, so estimating its actual cost is nearly impossible.

Sanders’ platform is not just universal healthcare, though. While that is certainly his biggest talking point, he also talks a lot about free state college and the Green New Deal. His free college plan, called College For All, aims to do just about exactly what you would expect: provide free public education to all citizens. The plan’s theory is that making all college education paid for by the government would force prices down on college education, similarly to his healthcare plan, as the government controlling the market would give it more control over profit margins and overall cost, so the cost of this plan on the government would not be as great as it initially seems.

The Green New Deal on the other hand is a talking point of many politicians, and Sanders is a big proponent of it. As the name implies, it is a plan to increase the use of renewable energy in the US, and create jobs in doing so. The allusion to FDR’s New Deal also implies the scope of the plan. More than just moving to renewable energy, it also aims to protect forests, hold fossil fuel companies accountable for the harm they do to the environment, and more.

The big caveat to everything Sanders proposes is how he plans to pay for it, though. His plans usually include clever ways to reduce the cost, but at the end of the day, tax raises will be necessary. Sanders points out that he only plans on raising taxes on the wealthy and on big businesses though, and the average American will not see any large change in their taxes, but many critics are skeptical and say that taxing the wealthy will not be enough to pay for everything he plans on. As noted with his healthcare plan though, his plans are huge and trying to estimate the exact cost of everything is incredibly difficult.