By guest host Anthony Brooks:

As health care costs continue to rise and employer-based insurance coverage continues to shrink, more and more Americans are living without health insurance. It’s a problem that afflicts the working poor and a growing share of the middle class.

Now a number of states — from California to Illinois to Connecticut — are working to expand access to health coverage. In Massachusetts a controversial plan — both generous and tough — would require most businesses to provide health insurance to their employees and require all residents to buy health insurance. The ambitious goal: to cover virtually all of the state’s half-million uninsured residents.

Can it work? Can it solve a problem that Washington has turned its back on?

Hear how the states are tackling the crisis of the uninsured.

Guests:

Alan Weil, Executive Director of the National Academy for State Health Policy

Michael Cannon, Director of Health Policy Studies at the Cato Institute

John McDonough, Executive Director of Massachusett’s-based Health Care For All

Bill Waczak, CEO of Codman Square Health Center in Boston.