Medicare for All polls better than the Republican approach to health care — and, under certain framing, enjoys majority support. But when surveys spotlight the policy’s implications for the tax code and the availability of private insurance, that support tends to decline precipitously.

The Achilles heel of democracy will always be democracy.

Bernie and a couple of other potential candidates know that M4A is a very deflationary policy, even if no added taxes or premiums were collected to “pay for” it. M4A was found to cost $1 Trillion per year less than our current system in a study conducted by a Koch funded organization, so is likely understated. It is mostly unproductive activity, but it does employ around a million workers, directly and those employed by healthcare providers to administer the many plans from many companies to secure payment.

One simply doesn’t yank a $Trillion from the economy and make a million workers unemployed while also drawing more money from the economy to “pay for” it and expect anything but an economic disaster. Leaving the people with the money they currently spend on healthcare premiums and out of pocket expenses may not even be enough to balance the job and fiscal loss. However, the average voter is hardly able to balance a checkbook, so explaining complex macroeconomics to them in the middle of an emotional campaign is not wise. Confused people always default to the status quo.

If you take note of who and what Bernie wants to tax when replying to the “payfor” question you’ll see that they are those that should be taxed, with or without M4A, simply because their extreme wealth is dangerous to our democratic process, or is an activity that is damaging to the economy. He will probably use the spending for the Green New Deal to compensate for the large drain that M4A guarantees. His plan also starts with the youngest demographic and progresses toward the oldest, most expensive, demographic so that adjustments can be made without extreme impact.