Ganesh Sitaraman and Anne L. Alstott

Harvard Book Store welcomes acclaimed authors GANESH SITARAMAN—Professor of Law and Director at the Program on Law and Government at Vanderbilt Law School—and ANNE L. ALSTOTT—Jacquin D. Bierman Professor at the Yale Law School—for a discussion of their new book, The Public Option: How to Expand Freedom, Increase Opportunity, and Promote Equality. This event is co-sponsored by Mass Humanities.

About The Public Option

Whenever you go to your local public library, send mail via the post office, or visit Yosemite, you are taking advantage of a longstanding American tradition: the public option. Some of the most useful and beloved institutions in American life are public options―yet they are seldom celebrated as such. These government-supported opportunities coexist peaceably alongside private options, ensuring equal access and expanding opportunity for all.

Ganesh Sitaraman and Anne Alstott challenge decades of received wisdom about the proper role of government and consider the vast improvements that could come from the expansion of public options. Far from illustrating the impossibility of effective government services, as their critics claim, public options hold the potential to transform American civic life, offering a wealth of solutions to seemingly intractable problems, from housing shortages to the escalating cost of health care.

Imagine a low-cost, high-quality public option for child care. Or an extension of the excellent Thrift Savings Plan for federal employees to all Americans. Or every person having access to an account at the Federal Reserve Bank, with no fees and no minimums. From broadband internet to higher education, The Public Option reveals smart new ways to meet pressing public needs while spurring healthy competition. More effective than vouchers or tax credits, public options could offer us all fairer choices and greater security.

Praise for The Public Option

“Timely, important, and convincing, this book is pretty much the definition of ‘fresh thinking.’ Key reading for a political generation that is on the search for new ideas for old problems.” ―Tim Wu, author of The Curse of Bigness: Antitrust in the New Gilded Age

“At a time of widespread debates about the role of public provision, Sitaraman and Alstott make a vibrant case for developing and preserving public options in education, health care, child care, broadband access, banking, and retirement benefits. To get beyond slogans and move toward real and practical proposals to improve the daily lives of Americans, and strengthen our commitments to others, read this book.” ―Martha Minow, author of Partners, Not Rivals: Privatization and the Public Good

“We are so accustomed to arguments that government only infringes upon freedom that we forget how government, when intelligently deployed, can expand our choices―and yes, make us more free. In this important book Ganesh Sitaraman and Anne Alstott make a brilliant, clear, and accessible case for how public options in areas such as banking, health care, and child care can improve lives, especially for those whom the marketplace marginalizes. We already celebrate many public options, such as our great public universities and libraries. Sitaraman and Alstott urge us to think inventively about other areas where public options could make our nation both better and fairer.” ―E. J. Dionne, Jr., coauthor of One Nation After Trump and author of Our Divided Political Heart