Hmm, I think you may still be confusing some things?
I addressed the mandate portion of this in some long comments on an earlier post. First, to make it very clear, the mandate (everyone must get insurance) is an integral part of the reform, and completely orthogonal to the public plan. Regardless of what happens with a public plan, there will be a mandate.
The reason for the mandate is this: We're going to require insurance companies to cover everyone, accept everyone, and not disqualify "pre-existing conditions". If we don't mandate insurance, that'd leave the option open for people to not pay when they are healthy, and then sign up for insurance once they discover some condition or injury that's going to need ongoing care. We're much better off spreading the risk fairly, the way we do with taxpayer-funded programs. You can't opt out of taxes for a particular service until you feel like you need it.
Now, you say Obama promised that the public option would be different from private insurance because costs for poor people would be offset by wealthier people paying more. That's false. Another integral part of this reform is subsidies for low income people to buy insurance, and that is going to be subsidized by higher taxes on wealthy people, but that is also completely orthogonal to the public plan, and it was always going to be - we're going to have those subsidies, and corresponding taxes, regardless of whether there's a public option in the mix or not. Obama never said differently.
The other way you're talking about is, as I said above, also not a feature of the public option. Congress is going to mandate that all insurance companies accept everyone, and cover pre-existing conditions, and that everyone buy insurance. That'll be part of the legislation regardless of whether one of the options for insurance is a public plan or not.
A public plan will be, effectively, a single-payer insurance, but only for those companies and people who want it. If everyone flocks to it instantly (which is not going to happen) then we'll effectively have national single payer - but Congress won't have chosen it, the people will have voted with their feet/wallets. Obviously a big change like that won't happen suddenly. However, if the government can indeed run a better, more efficient, more transparent, less frustrating health insurance than the private companies do now, then people and companies *will* steadily switch over to it, which will force the private companies to improve their service. Either they'll improve to a point where they're as good as the government, and thus don't lose customers, or they'll find new business models (such as adding extra value), or they'll wither away. No matter which of these happens, the result will be better insurance for all of us.
That's why we deserve to get a public option, and that is exactly the point of my letter.
no subject
I addressed the mandate portion of this in some long comments on an earlier post. First, to make it very clear, the mandate (everyone must get insurance) is an integral part of the reform, and completely orthogonal to the public plan. Regardless of what happens with a public plan, there will be a mandate.
The reason for the mandate is this: We're going to require insurance companies to cover everyone, accept everyone, and not disqualify "pre-existing conditions". If we don't mandate insurance, that'd leave the option open for people to not pay when they are healthy, and then sign up for insurance once they discover some condition or injury that's going to need ongoing care. We're much better off spreading the risk fairly, the way we do with taxpayer-funded programs. You can't opt out of taxes for a particular service until you feel like you need it.
Now, you say Obama promised that the public option would be different from private insurance because costs for poor people would be offset by wealthier people paying more. That's false. Another integral part of this reform is subsidies for low income people to buy insurance, and that is going to be subsidized by higher taxes on wealthy people, but that is also completely orthogonal to the public plan, and it was always going to be - we're going to have those subsidies, and corresponding taxes, regardless of whether there's a public option in the mix or not. Obama never said differently.
The other way you're talking about is, as I said above, also not a feature of the public option. Congress is going to mandate that all insurance companies accept everyone, and cover pre-existing conditions, and that everyone buy insurance. That'll be part of the legislation regardless of whether one of the options for insurance is a public plan or not.
A public plan will be, effectively, a single-payer insurance, but only for those companies and people who want it. If everyone flocks to it instantly (which is not going to happen) then we'll effectively have national single payer - but Congress won't have chosen it, the people will have voted with their feet/wallets. Obviously a big change like that won't happen suddenly. However, if the government can indeed run a better, more efficient, more transparent, less frustrating health insurance than the private companies do now, then people and companies *will* steadily switch over to it, which will force the private companies to improve their service. Either they'll improve to a point where they're as good as the government, and thus don't lose customers, or they'll find new business models (such as adding extra value), or they'll wither away. No matter which of these happens, the result will be better insurance for all of us.
That's why we deserve to get a public option, and that is exactly the point of my letter.