It was a powerful photo op today on the east steps of the state Capitol.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Three of the leaders of the California Legislature. And the CEOs of a few dozen of California's biggest, and most successful, companies.

The subject: the health care crisis. The solution: stay tuned.

Over the past few weeks, this coalition of business leaders has been readying itself to join the health care debate here in Sacramento. Meanwhile, private negotiations have continued among a whole host of stakeholder interest groups.

But over the course of today's event, it became clear that the only real consensus is that everyone should work together. Beyond that, the issue as a news story seems stuck... until someone breaks the stalemate over who's covered, how to cover them, and who pays.

The new business group, known as the Coalition to Advance Healthcare Reform, has laid out five overarching principles-- a mantra espoused today by the group's leader, Safeway CEO Steve Burd: use "market forces" to lower costs, require everyone to have health insurance, subsidize health care for the poor, promote prevention and healthy lifestyles, and allow taxpayers to write off the cost of their health insurance.

A few of those principles-- most notably, mandatory health insurance-- have also been espoused by the governor. But back to the issue of who pays... at today's news conference, I asked Mr. Burd whether he (or any of the CEOs) support the governor's call for businesses to either provide health insurance or pay 4% of their payroll into a new state pool.

His answer (actually, you can listen to the entire answer here): "We're not here to talk about a prescription for a solution. We think the best framework is to get some ideas on the table... and look to see where the market can help us solve this." Toward the end of his answer, Burd said that his group doesn't want to "prejudge any particular issue right now."

Burd was deft at avoiding that big sticking point, because he knows that legislative Republicans abhor the payroll fee/tax suggested by Schwarzenegger, as do a lot of small business owners. And while he did discuss ways to find money-- including something called "transparency" and by cutting down waste-- the bottom line of this debate still seems to be... well... the bottom line of money.