Voter Sentiment: Health care reform, which ranks among the highest priorities
for voters, should include a law that requires employers to provide health
insurance or pay into a fund that would help pay for it, according to 81 percent
of respondents to a survey published in January by the Commonwealth Fund, a New
York foundation that supports health care research.
Eighty-eight percent of Democrats, 73 percent of Republicans and 79 percent
of independent voters voiced that sentiment. Conversely, laws requiring
individuals to purchase health insurance, with help from the government if they
cannot afford to, drew less support. There were wide differences between
Republicans, 52 percent of whom strongly or somewhat favored the idea, and
Democrats, 80 percent of whom strongly favored or somewhat favored individual
mandates.
This raises the question the authors asked next: Who should pay for health
care: employers, the government or individuals? Perhaps not surprisingly,
two-thirds of voters said all three. One in five Democrats believed the
government should incur most of the cost while one in 10 Republicans held that
view. One in 10 Republicans believed individuals should bear most of the cost of
health care. When asked whether employers should bear most of the cost, most
people said no. Only 8 percent of Democrats, Republicans and independents said
employers should pay most of the cost of health insurance.
= Member Only
