Atrios, in response to complaints that single-payer healthcare will be unpopular:

The wrong idea out there is that any transition to a new thing might be A) complicated and costly and therefore B) unpopular. A) is probably true. B) is only true because in our neoliberal world few can imagine that the complications and costs don't actually have to fall on individual voters who are already busy spending two hours on the phone with Comcast.

Why should voters bear the costs? The government can eat the costs and take care of the complexity and I can show up to the doctor with my medicare card and have it be paid for.

I tend to agree with him that the “complicated and costly” part is a solvable problem. However, I don’t think that is what most people opposed to changing the current system are worried about.

I think people 1) are worried that either whatever replaces the current system will be worse, or 2) think that even if the system now is crappy, it’s better than some new and unknown thing. I’m not sure how we convince them that doesn’t have to be the case.