Why is the public option important to you

With various politicians seeming willing to give up the public option, I am wondering what everyone here thinks about why they are so strongly in favor of it. It seems to be a line in the sand for many people, and I want to see people's views on why it matters to them.

For me the biggest reasons are cost, moral repulsion of private insurers and not wanting the US to be a plutocracy.

With cost, the CBO estimates a public option would save about $150 billion over 10 years. Plus a strong public option would be 20-30% cheaper than private insurance. So for a single guy like me, private insurance may cost $4000 a year but a public option is only $3000. For a family private insurance is $12000, a public option is $9500. However those are with medicare reimbursement rates, and doctors might bristle at those. Public plans might use 96% of funds on healthcare, private plans may use 80%. Given the choice of a public vs private plan, the economics alone makes me want a public plan. However even if the public plan were the same price as private (it would be cheaper, even with non-medicare rates due to lower overhead) I'd still pick the public plan. As a progressive I believe some things are better done by the public sector, and health care is one of them.

With moral repulsion and plutocracy, I have seen the health insurance companies practice real life death panels and deny life saving treatment to people, then use premiums and profits to buy ads designed to trick stupid people into thinking a government option will have death panels that deny life saving treatment. I feel like I am giving money to a company that uses part of that money to hire people designed to deny life saving care (I think they spend $50 billion a year on overhead denying care) and to buy ads to trick and control stupid people. The idea that I'm going to be forced to buy private insurance pisses me off even more. That is basically proof we are a plutocracy. The fact that the US public shouldn't even be allowed to have the right to choose a public option (option for god's sake, its not even mandated public insurance like medicare) proves we are a plutocracy, and makes me feel somewhat despondent about all the hope and efforts to change things in 2006 and 2008. Its almost like if the public were disgusted by corporate control of their nation, and one of the first things the new leaders who were elected to change things did was pass a law mandating everyone have a car, but Ford lobbied congress to force everyone to buy Fords, and deprived the public of the right to buy Hondas or Toyotas. The fact that the health insurance lobby can force us to buy their overpriced, morally questionable policies and not be allowed to buy a public option (which is cheaper and a morally superior choice) pisses me off. What the fuck was I voting for in 2006 and 2008? I guess a co-op is a way out, but a co-op isn't the same as a public option. It won't provide real competition. A public option is meant to be a compromise of single payer, if we can't even get a compromise of a compromise with supermajorities then we are in trouble.


Anyway, those are my views on why we need the public option. Does anyone have any other views on why it is important or unimportant? What are the views of people who feel it is unimportant? I'm sure people have some good arguments about it not being too important. The only 'good' argument against the public option is that it might make it easier to pass health reform. But that isn't a good argument. The argument that 'it will drive private insurance out of business' is an argument for the public option, not against it. DVDs drove the VHS industry out of business. That is because they are higher quality and work better. The response shouldn't be making it impossible for consumers to be allowed to buy DVDs.

I am at the point where I feel health reform that involved ending pre-existing conditions, caps, rescissions, and that had annual caps and cost controls would be worth pursuing even w/o a public option. However it would be proof we live in a plutocracy, and that our efforts to take the country back in 2006 and 2008 were not as powerful as we might have thought.

So it'd be a bittersweet victory. We'd get UHC, but it would be UHC that involved a $150+ billion handout to corporations and that left morally questionable industries in charge of one of the most important aspects of our economy.