I heard an Obama radio ad in which he said he was going to reduce the cost of healthcare for a typical family by $2500 per year. In 2006 the cost of healthcare in the US was $2 trillion, or about $6700 per person. The insurance premium for an individual was $4200 and for a family of four was $11,500. In most cases an employer paid a large share of that. Considering these facts, it is hard to tell what Obama is actually proposing. My guess is that some aide came up with the number on the back of an envelope, aand there is no serious analysis behind the claim. For example how is a typical family defined? And is the cost reduction in their insurance premium or in their medical expense that is covered by insurance? It may be that he is talking about a poor family, and he is going to have the government pick part of the cost of their insurance by "taxing the rich." I suspect that is what he is actually talking about. If he is taling about reducing the actual healtcare cost then he would be claiming that he can reduce health care cost by approximately 12.5% (assuming a typical family is three people). The people who want socialized medicine usually claim they can reduce overall expenditures, and they can by limiting access. Their idea is that they are fair because in theory they limit access for everyone; in reality this doesn't happen because the really rich, the guys socialists claim to hate, can go to India for care. I suspect Obama is talking about soaking the rich to pay for healthcare in the near term, with full fledged socialised medicine with the intent of punishing the rich in the future. In reading about him and his writings, it seems to me that he really doesn't like white people, and is out for revenge (despite the fact that he and his wife make nearly $1 million per year).