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What do you think about the Public Option? (m.youtube.com)

submitted 5 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) by bluejade@lemmy.ca to c/canadapolitics@lemmy.ca

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The video is David Doel's breakdown of the recent NDP leadership debate, and covers a lot of angles. I wanted to focus discussion on a specific element, the argument for public options, which takes up a good chunk of it, citing programs in other countries or certain provinces.

I'm not necessarily arguing that you should vote for your NDP candidate, or like any of the NDP leadership candidates. But it would be good to focus on some of the benefits (and tradeoffs) of the public option when it comes to things like telephone costs, healthcare, groceries, housing, etc.

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[–] maplesaga@lemmy.world 1 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

What is the point of a public option when the existing problems are all caused by government bureaucracy to begin with, why not just end those with regulation overhaul?

-I believe grocerys problem in Canada are zoning laws, that make commercial real estate prohibitively expensive, as their margins on grocery sales are extremely low. Look at commercial rents and the lack of mixed commercial/residential zoning in Canada, thats all passed on as higher prices.

-Telecoms are 100% government controlled, nobody can open a carrier given how wireless signals are regulated, to avoid collisions on the wireless spectrums. But margins are low at 5.5% and the stocks all suck to own, so something else has to be the cause. The huge costs we pay are likely going from citizens to the government, with the largest cost being the cellular frequency lottery held by the government, which makes it effectively a hefty tax.

-Housing is zoning, huge developer taxes that have increased thousands of percent, slow permitting, and of course the 4% annual population growth we did with bipartisan support of the Liberals and NDP. So the NDP helped cause this problem as they called anyone who spoke out against it a racist, to the detriment of the poor and the young.