Hillary's Health Plan Covers 22 Million More

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have health plans that sound similar but are vastly different in effect, the New York Times' Paul Krugman writes. Obama wants to make coverage affordable in the hope that Americans will sign up—a change that seems unlikely considering current coverage patterns. But Hillary's plan would mandate care, cover 22 million more Americans, and make health care nearly universal.

Hillary would mandate care for 45 million people (nearly everybody) for $124 billion per year, while Obama would only cover 23 million for $102 billion per year, an M.I.T. economist says. "That doesn’t look like a trivial difference to me," Krugman writes. Of course Hillary may never get her plan through Congress, but at least would give universal health care a real chance.