The case against the public option, as seen by insurance company execs.
Author: Mark Kleiman
Professor of Public Policy at the NYU Marron Institute for Urban Management and editor of the Journal of Drug Policy Analysis. Teaches about the methods of policy analysis about drug abuse control and crime control policy, working out the implications of two principles: that swift and certain sanctions don't have to be severe to be effective, and that well-designed threats usually don't have to be carried out. Books: Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know (with Jonathan Caulkins and Angela Hawken) When Brute Force Fails: How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment (Princeton, 2009; named one of the "books of the year" by The Economist Against Excess: Drug Policy for Results (Basic, 1993) Marijuana: Costs of Abuse, Costs of Control (Greenwood, 1989) UCLA Homepage Curriculum Vitae Contact: Markarkleiman-at-gmail.com View all posts by Mark Kleiman
Aren't health insurance companies too big to fail too?
80% public support for a public option is a pretty tendentious claim (not that I look to actors for schooling on public opinion). Nate Silver has looked at how questions on a public option are framed, and shows that (a) most people don't understand what it is tinyurl.com/kk5p9s, and (b) responses are very sensitive to small changes in wording tinyurl.com/macfyn. Support for a public option seems to be higher among those who understand what it is, but I'd wager that there's a strong selection effect.
That is inane. If the point is to try and convince those who may be leaning the other way, ridicule is hardly a viable option. The writer should have his license taken away for political claptrapment.