Cost Estimate of Universal Health Care Coverage in California Total spending on health care in California at present is $368.5 billion. percent of California’s 2016 GDP. This represents 14.2 At present, California’s health care system includes 33.4 million people (92.5 percent) who have some form of health insurance coverage and 2.7 million (7.5 percent) who are uninsured. However, among the insured, about 12 million people—36 percent of the insured—are underinsured. These are people whose health insurance provisions include high deductibles and/or large out-of-pocket expenses. Pollin, Heintz, Arno and Wicks-Lim, “Economic Analysis of Healthy California” May 2017 Page 2 The primary goal of Healthy California is to provide high-quality health care to all California residents. We estimate that to achieve this under California’s existing health care system would increase overall costs of the system by 9.6 percent. Health care spending in California would thus increase to $404.1 billion under the existing system.