77% of the public supports a public option.  Medicare and the VA have higher customer satisfaction rates than corporate insurers.  Medicare and the VA have lower overhead (2-3%) than corporate insurers (11-30%), do not dictate which doctor you may see (unlike corporate insurers) and do not discriminate against people with a preexisting condition (corporate insurers do). 

Every industrialized country in the world insures all of its people except the United States and gets better outcomes (lower infant mortality and higher life spans) than the US at only 50-60% of the cost.  No one goes bankrupt due to medical bills anywhere in the industrialized world except the US, where medical bills cause 62% of all bankruptcies.  Of those in the US who go bankrupt due to medical expenses, over 75% have health insurance

Republicans have had two suggestions in this entire debate over the last few months that don’t involve maintaining the status quo: (1) give insurers protection against malpractice awards, (2) let insurers sell across state lines (so much for states’ rights).

But states that have enacted laws to prevent or limit medical malpractice claims (Texas, California, Florida, and Alabama, among others) have not seen a reduction in either their health insurance rates or the rate at which those costs have increased.  The only other proposal Republicans have supported would allow health insurance companies to sell across state lines at the lowest levels of consumer protection provided by any state. 

The bottom line is that a private corporate insurer has two goals to maximize profit: (1) take in as much revenue in premiums as possible and (2) spend as little on covering those people they insure as possible.  That doesn’t work in a world where any one of us would spend or do anything to save the life or alleviate the pain of the ones we love.  Even if there were perfect competition, the free market choices we make when we’re buying cars or coffee don’t operate in the same way when we’re talking about the invaluable life of a loved one.

The only viable argument against a strong public option is that health insurance shouldn’t be an option at all - it should be Medicare for all.