The American Medical Association (AMA), the largest organization representing the nation’s doctors, feels that the uninsured could receive full medical coverage if the government offered them tax credits specifically appropriated for health insurance.

The AMA is advocating the abolishment of the current tax exclusion for employer health benefits and replacing it with tax credit vouchers that low-income workers could use to purchase insurance packages. AMA president, Dr. Donald J. Palmisano says, “[Our] proposal allows people to select their own insurance. It allows them a mechanism so they can afford the insurance with refundable tax credit.”

Currently, health insurance benefits provided to workers by their employers are excluded from taxation. Palmisano believes that the money saved from abolishing this tax exclusion might be better put to use as a tax credit for low-income, uninsured Americans. The AMA plans illustrates how money would be diverted from the current system toward a system of tax credits for low-income taxpayers in the form of a yearly voucher.

The plan also state that the consumers who purchased a policy using the voucher would gain “guaranteed renewability,” meaning that their insurance would continue in the event that they lost their job or became injured or ill.

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