Tell Your Legislators What You Want In Health-Care Reform

There is an alternative for those Americans who in the past have gone without health insurance. The answer is to have health-care reform that offers a health-care exchange with the public option.

Under this health-care reform a health-care exchange would be available for small businesses that have trouble providing insurance for their employees, to the self-employed and to the uninsured. This health-care marketplace would offer a choice of several private plans as well as another plan called the public option. Individuals are free to choose whichever plan is best for them.

The public option is a nonprofit plan that will support itself with member premiums only and will have to compete with the private insurance plans to give us out best health-care value. Unlike the other options proposed, only the public option would have the size needed to negotiate prices with the health-care providers and offer a competitive alternative to private plans.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates show that the public option is being unnecessarily vilified by the reform critics. The CBO forecasts that the private insurance plans have the opportunity to gain 16 million new customers under health-care reform. Approximately 1 in 10 Americans are expected to the enter health-care exchange and only approximately 11 to 12 million -- or just over 3% of Americans -- will actually choose the public option. With the public option we will have fair market competition while at the same time controlling rising health-care costs.

Congress must act now to pass this health-care reform. Let's all email our legislators and tell them what we want.

***** Robert Reich Public Option Video *****