there is no such thing as a free lunch

Just because something is not free doesn't mean that a private organization should be entitled to sell it. In many cases this just becomes an additional friction to everyone. For example, health care is something that everybody needs and is not free. But this doesn't mean that paying a private company is the best option. Companies need to profit from health care to exist, which in turn drives up costs for everyone and makes the economy less competitive. This is clearly happening in the US.

You are under the impression that a profit motive drives up prices? Would we be in a better situation if the government was in charge of growing and distributing all food?

The analogy isn't appropriate, in my opinion. It's viable to start a new grocery business and consumers can exercise choices in which ones they frequent. These options are not nearly as viable for healthcare (particularly in emergencies or when seeing specialists) or postal services (when serving an area as broad as the US).

True, but the question is always: what level of profit is reasonable? A corporation, absent regulation, will charge as much as the market will bear. If they can charge twice as much but only lose a quarter of their customers, they'll do it. Such a situation with something like water would be a disaster. People would die.

They will not charge as much as the market can bear. They will charge as much as they can without competition eating their market share.

There is no regulation for instance on the cost of soda, but it is not priced as high as the market can bear. Soda is incredibly cheap and requires no government interference to be cheap.

We already have this situation going on in the health care industry. Companies will raise prices as long as profits can be increased. A large amount of the US population can't afford to have access to health care anymore.

Profits are capped, and economists agree that such caps are not helpful.

https://www.aeaweb.org/research/regulating-health-insurers-a...