Reply #11: A few reasons, we have all heard that this "public option"

[slipslidingaway]

might very well lead to a single-payer someday and people decided to support this as a stepping stone.

Also this is supposed to provide competition to the big insurance companies, but with so small a number of enrollees how competitive will it be?

Our tax dollars will be used to subsidize the private insurance companies, who then lobby against our interests, especially when estimates are that so few will choose the public option.

The US is not flush with cash, using any "Medicare savings" to pay for the public option (much of which will go to private firms) when estimates are that the number of enrollees in Medicare will increase from 46 million to 79 million in the next two decades does not add up for me. How do you support that large of a shift into Medicare without raising taxes or cutting services for that segment of the population, any Medicare efficiencies will be needed to offset higher enrollments.

If this "government-sponsored public option" falters then opponents of a national system will point to it as an example of how a national system will not work.