The reconciliation bill has a lot to love in it. Spearheaded by Bernie Sanders and following most of President Biden’s budget priorities, one of it’s major provisions lowers the Medicare eligibility age to 60 and adds dental, vision and hearing coverage. While this is a significant and hard-fought expansion, it mainly benefits less than 5% of the population aged 60-65, and provides some extra benefits to the ~15% of the population over 65. And there is a large price tag attached for taxpayers. As a liberal, I am fully on board with making rich people finally pay their fair share of taxes to cover this and the rest of the bill, but we all must realize that there *is* a political price also. There is plenty of evidence for this in Biden’s own primary campaign where he stressed both the cost and lack of choice in “Medicare For All”.
So why doesn’t the reconciliation package include a Public Option for the ACA? Why is no one even discussing the possibility? A public option buy-in for anyone purchasing health insurance on the ACA market could easily be the plan with the best coverage at the lowest cost, benefitting tens of millions of citizens of all ages. And it could be done at *no cost to the taxpayer* since all costs would be covered by premiums. A public option could also save the states significant amounts of money if they opened up their Medicaid recipients to it instead of using Medicaid dollars to purchase private insurance. Studies show that a public option would even benefit those who don’t use it by creating more competition in the insurance market and driving down premiums for private plans.
I ask again with all sincerity. Why is there no discussion of a public option currently when is has so many proven benefits, basically zero cost, and was a major issue in the Presidential campaign?