Bernie Sanders has released his Medicare-for-All plan

Vox explains, Bernie Sanders has released his Medicare-for-All plan. Here’s how he pays for it.

Hillary Clinton's campaign has been charging that Sanders' health care vision necessarily entails higher taxes on the middle class. Sanders plan is structured to try to avoid that accusation — levying its payroll tax on employers rather than employees and calling its 2.2 percent flat income tax "premiums" rather than a tax. But in effect, working people — whether wealthy or not — will be paying higher taxes. The Sanders camp's real argument is that, all things considered, the average family would save money.

Friedman finds that a typical family of four with wages of $50,000 and an employer health-plan with $4,955 in annual premiums and a $1,318 deductible would pay only $466 through the new 2.2 percent tax, and save $5,807, or 12 percent of income, on net. Friedman also finds that an employer paying $12,591 toward an employee's health plan would pay $3,100 in the new 6.2 percent payroll tax, and save $9,491.