Billionaire investor Mark Cuban said he is “all for” universal care, writing that other countries make “Most Things available to All People,” while the U.S. makes “Everything available to Most People.”
Cuban posted on X on Thursday that it would be nice to find a way to reduce the cost of care and make it available to everyone, and proposed a commission of healthcare stakeholders, adding: “No reason we can’t start now.”
Cuban on Universal Care
Cuban wrote that “it will take work to get there” and that the model in other countries is “not perfect.” He asked how to make “the best possible care and therapies, regardless of cost” available to everyone.
He recommended Abdul El-Sayed’s book on Medicare for All, saying it “wisely had more questions than answers,” and asked whether the answer is Medicare for All, global budgets “or something else.”
Cuban’s Commission Proposal
“My hope is that we can put together a Simpson Bowles type, Blue Ribbon Commission,” Cuban wrote, adding that it should include representatives of all stakeholders, such as patients, rural and urban hospitals and pharma companies.
A blue-ribbon commission is a panel of prominent experts brought together to work on contentious policy issues outside the usual partisan fights. The Simpson-Bowles Commission, formally the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, is an example.
Cuban said that telling those working in the healthcare system what to do is “the fastest way for this to fail,” and called for a “non partisan manner of running our American version of Universal Care.”
Marc Goldwein, senior vice president and senior policy director at the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, replied that he was working on something similar and had served on the first Simpson-Bowles.
Earlier Healthcare Cost Debate
Cuban had previously urged Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) in an X post to back the bipartisan “Break Up Big Medicine” bill from Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), which would bar companies from owning both a health insurer and a pharmacy benefit manager. He said it would make drug prices “drop like a rock.”
Costs have also weighed on workers. A KFF survey released in October found workers’ average annual contribution toward family premiums rose 9% to $7,471 in 2026.
Separately, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services had projected the average monthly Medicare Advantage premium would fall from $14.37 in 2026 to $12 in 2027, with CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz saying, “CMS is keeping premiums stable.”
Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
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