So how is health care for illegal immigrants going to be paid? I can see a couple of problems.

All the Democrat Socialist candidates raised their hands during the debates, stating they would all pay for free health care for illegal immigrants, so now this becomes something we have to seriously consider. I understand that Medicare is now funded by taxes.

What I am seeing is a problem with limits.

The same candidates who want to provide free health care for illegal immigrants also don't want to limit the number of illegal immigrants who can just decide they want to live here, and come up through the the southern border, without end.

So basically, we're talking unlimited free health care for anyone and everyone in the world who just decides they want to live here. We are talking about people who, for the most part, can't speak English, and can't read and write English, and they will only be able to get the most low paying jobs because of that, if they can even find an employer willing to hire them.

The lowest wage earners will not be able to earn enough individually to pay in enough taxes to cover the cost of free Medicare for themselves, and they have definitely not been paying health care taxes into the system since their teens to cover the cost.

Portland, Maine, is now filled to bursting with a large number of African illegal immigrants. That particular lot feel very entitled, and began demanding their free benefits quite rudely the moment they arrived. People are coming to the southern border from all over the world expecting a free lunch.

At what point will the system crash due to overload?

I am only interested in polite and well thought out responses. Rude or abusive people, please do not respond.

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CountScrofula · 41-45, M

Undocumented immigrants pay into society and receive far less from their taxes than citizens. The "we can't afford them" is a false narrative.

4meAndyou · F

@CountScrofula Unfortunately I have never been able to get anyone to show me how a minimum wage earner, (as almost all non-English speaking and illiterate illegal immigrant workers are), can pay enough in taxes to cover health care costs, let alone public school costs, welfare benefits, and all the other things for which people are taxed. No one seems to be able to back up their words with mathematics.

Usually that cost is absorbed by others who are able to earn more, and it averages out. But with massive influxes of new minimum wage earning population, on an unlimited basis, those averages will tilt toward the negative. The progressive candidates now want to allow anyone from anywhere in the world to just decide they want to come here, taking those averages down even further.

CountScrofula · 41-45, M

@4meAndyou Why should roads be free if wealthy people pay for roads more than poor people? The argument applies in the same way.

4meAndyou · F

@CountScrofula Just reading a little bit about Medicare, which is our current form of free health insurance. You have to pay into it for 30 to 39 quarters...that's 9.75 years, before you can begin to receive benefits, at which point you would be billed $240 per month for standard Part A coverage with a $1,364.00 deductible and 20% co-insurance. Medicare is predicated on the idea that participants will pay in toward it for a long period of time.

If we begin to provide free health care coverage for illegal immigrants they will probably receive minimum wage, with no history of paying in toward benefits. Using minimum wage figures for California, ($12.00 per hour) and a 40 hour work week, we see, using the 2019 tax calculator,

https://us.thetaxcalculator.net/hourly-wage-tax-calculator

that the minimum wage earner only pays $1,337.20 per year in federal taxes, and $1,909.44 toward eventual social security benefits. For our purposes, $1,337.20 is the only federal tax money that would go toward health insurance and other tax needs. If you look at the federal tax pie, less than 1/3 (22%) goes toward health care. 22% of $1,337.20 = $607.81

Somehow, I can't see how $607.81 a year is going to cover the cost.

https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/us_budget_pie_chart

Here is a website showing the average cost of health insurance in about 10 states. Kansas, the cheapest state, charges $2,352 per year.

"Health insurance premiums have risen dramatically over the past decade. In the past, insurers would price your health insurance based on any number of factors, but after the Affordable Care Act, the number of variables that impact your health insurance costs have been reduced dramatically. We conducted a study to look at how health insurance premiums vary based on these characteristics. In our data we illustrate these differences by using an example 21 year old. Older consumers will see higher rates with 30 year olds paying 1.135 times more, 40 year olds paying 1.278 times more, 50 year olds paying 1.786x and 64 year olds paying 2.714 times the cost listed."

https://www.valuepenguin.com/average-cost-of-health-insurance