More Americans support the idea of a government health care program that covers everybody than oppose it ― but support is still short of a majority, according to a new HuffPost/YouGov poll. The polling, conducted Oct. 11-12 and Oct. 18-20, found support for “Medicare for All” at 43% (Oct. 11-12) and 44% (Oct. 18-20) when a source for funding wasn’t mentioned at all. Support for such a program dipped if it would be paid for with a payroll tax on workers. But half of Americans said they would support a Medicare for All proposal if it’s financed by an annual tax on people whose net worth is above $50 million. Only one-third of those surveyed said they opposed Medicare for All if it’s paid for with a so-called wealth tax. The variation in support highlights the fact that Americans’ opinions about Medicare for All remain fairly malleable and that support depends on assumptions about how such a program would work and be funded.

Half of Americans said they would support a 'Medicare for All' proposal if it’s financed by an annual tax on people worth more than $50 million.

How to pay for a single-payer health system has become a pressing question in the Democratic presidential primary, with candidates berating Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) for refusing to admit she supports higher taxes as part of the proposal. Taxing the rich has long been popular in the U.S., but a problem for Warren is that she has already said she’d use a tax on people worth $50 million for her education plan. Another problem is that according to several analysts, other taxes on the rich probably wouldn’t raise enough revenue to cover Medicare for All. In her public statements, Warren has implied that she’d support new taxes on the middle class as part of her health plan, but she has not said so directly. Instead, she has suggested taxes would replace more onerous health costs such as premiums and deductibles, and she’s insisted the trade-off would benefit the middle class. “Costs will go up for the wealthy and for big corporations, and for hard-working middle-class families, costs will go down,” Warren said at a debate this month. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), by contrast, has explicitly said “it is appropriate to acknowledge that taxes will go up,” especially for the wealthy, but the middle class will pay “substantially less than what they were paying for premiums and out-of-pocket expenses.” In the past, Sanders has floated several new taxes that could be used to offset the cost of Medicare for All, though he has not outright embraced any of them. Options include higher federal income taxes on the wealthy and a 7.5% payroll tax on employers, which would apply in lieu of monthly premiums that currently cost employers more than $14,000 annually per employee.

Brian Snyder / Reuters Democratic 2020 U.S. presidential candidate and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) campaigns at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, on Oct. 24, 2019.