What is a public option in the health care debate?

Do you understand the public option for health care issue?

• If we place a public option on a level playing field with private insurance then it will crush all private insurance on price vs features. It is quite simple: Private insurance adds at least 15% to the cost of health care for the reason of administration and profit. Medicare administration adds 3% to the cost of health care. Canada's health system adds 1% to the cost of health care. Therefore on a level playing field private insurance companies aren't going to be able to compete on price. I'm defining a level playing field as the public option only getting money from its customers, etc, in the same way private insurance does. With perhaps an option for subsidies for the poor. Do you like the public health care option despite this? Do you understand why there is resistance to this from certain industry lobbies?

• Answer:

  That's false. I'm a government employee. Our health care costs aren't THAT much better than yours.....but they are better. If more people opt in, then the price would be lower, but not so much lower that private for-profits couldn't make a profit. In fact, if they change their policies, they stand to make quite a bit of money, as they can add more people to their rolls. Not only that, but they can also opt to provide more coverage or more comprehensive coverage, so that people WANT their plan versus the plan offered to government workers. The USPS hasn't run FedEx and UPS out of business. In fact, they are thriving because they provide different services and benefits, and provide it at comparative costs. Same thing when Walmart comes to town offering better prices. It doesn't run out all other businesses, but it does allow for competition. Thus, some grocery stores try to match prices, while others don't match or come close to the prices of Walmart and, instead, provide better quality products, specialty products, and service/benefits that many people value more than price. It seems your goal is to be against allowing for choice. That isn't something most Americans should get behind.