Legal Commentary

Against Incrementalism When It Comes To The Public Option

By Big Tent Democrat

Ezra Klein writes:

This will not be a popular post, I fear. But one of the themes I'm seeing in a lot of the commentary is that the absence of a public plan is essentially equivalent to the absence of cost control, and the presence of a public plan is pretty much the presence of cost control. For the public plans on the table, that's not true, at least not in any way I can see. . . . The strongest public plan on offer is in the bill being considered by the House of Representatives. . . . The vast majority of Americans would be ineligible for the public plan, even if they wanted it. The CBO estimates that by 2019, the public plan would have a likely enrollment of 10 million Americans . . . The end result is that the public plan is unlikely to have a very large customer base, which means it will be unable to use market share to bargain prices far lower than private insurers.

So, Ezra argues, the public option is badly flawed because it is too incrementalist (and implicitly, not an important part of health care reform.) Of course, Ezra can not imagine the public option being expanded later. But Ezra is not usually so skeptical of potential expansion of health care reform initiatives in the future. When it is an initiative he likes, Ezra is gung ho for incrementalism:

It is one of the paradoxes of the legislative process that something that is substantively quite timid can also be quite bold. This version of health reform is far from what the country needs. It is far from what any health-care experts would develop left to their own devices. But it is still a monumental initiative and, if passed, it would be the most significant step forward since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid.

That was Ezra defending the Finance Committee health care reform framework sans the public option. Interesting when Ezra sees value in incrementalism and when he does not.

I wish he would just come out and say it - he is not for a public option. We all know it. He just needs to say it.

Speaking for me only

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 08, 2009 (boomark / email).