Business, Economics, Health, Media Criticism, Philosophy, Political Commentary, Social Commentary

The Risk To Liberty

17 Comments

It doesn’t come from the welfare state, but from central planning:

Obamacare provides the illustration of this, as I think many people have intuited. The “economic problem,” of course, is inescapable in health care. The supply of health care is scarce (only so many resources can be dedicated to it relative to other ends in society) and the demand is pretty close to unlimited. Somehow or other we have to decide how to allocate these scarce means among all the different ends–preventive medicine, end-of-life care, primary research, specialists v. generalists, etc.

Now one possibility that–thank goodness–we have historically rejected in the United States is the idea that certain people should just feel a moral obligation to die for the good of society. You do hear this sometimes–that some people should voluntarily forgo life-extending treatment for the “good of society”–and it sends chills down my spine. This is essentially the Maoist approach.

The alternative is to come up with some way of allocating scarce resources among competing wants. The myth of Obamacare is the same problem repeated: it rests on the idea that we can simply change the means of health care delivery (central planning of health insurance) but it will not require determining the ends at some point–i.e., in the end who gets treated and what treatments are covered and which are not. So, for example, the core of Obamacare is the system of cross-subsidies for some treatments (maternal care) and the expense of others (unmarried or infertile people). So infertile people have less money for things that they want to do (such as join a health club) because they now have to pay more money for things that the central planners have decided is more important than whatever they would do with their money.

And of course, E. J. Dionne remains clueless, as always.

17 thoughts on “The Risk To Liberty”

  1. It’s painful to watch otherwise intelligent people believe they—or their leaders—have the knowledge and wisdom to write rules (not even laws: mere regulations) that will classify, gather, and control the wants and needs of millions of people, few of whom are know to them. It’s more painful to suffer from their delusions of competence.

    1. The sad thing is that there are millions of people who think that politicians and bureaucrats will love them and take care of them.

  2. “So what? Liberty is over-rated anyway. It’s a nasty world, and you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs.”–Douchenozzle Guy.

    “Liberty is slavery! Only Dear Leader can give you true liberty–the liberty to obey!”–Baghdad Jim

  5. How can you have a massive welfare state without central planning? The central planners have to:

    decide how much money to steal from the earners
    decide who gets the money – pick winners and losers
    take their vig out
    build a bureaucracy to do all of that.

    and so much more.

  6. “The supply of health care is scarce (only so many resources can be dedicated to it relative to other ends in society) and the demand is pretty close to unlimited.”

    Federal policies have pushed American healthcare costs to the highest on the planet. Our system is based on reactionary medical processes not preventive medical processes. There is more money in managing an illness rather than curing an illiness. Almost all the new type II diabeties is preventable through the diet you chose as an individual. The current American diet almost guarantees you will get type $$ … oops type II . I would rather spend some of my taxdollars going to PREVENT emergency room priced healthcare and a little more on educating people on why they are idiots eating like they do.

  7. When the choice is between a corporate monopoly and a government monopoly I would take the government monopoly every single time. This applies both to natural monopolies, like rights of way for roads, water supply, or yes healthcare insurance. Which can vary from no coverage at all to complete coverage depending on how much that state is willing to pay. It should still be possible to get additional coverage however. This is possible in most countries in Europe. If not all of them.

    1. Healthcare insurance was not a monopoly and still isn’t, even though the feds are trying to put the industry out of business to impose a government monopoly. Look, if you would prefer that other people run your life, just stop voting.

      1. You need to read more. There is such a think as a natural monopoly. This applies to things like land or rights of way. Government intervention is not required. In this case it is not an obvious natural monopoly. But the thing is everyone needs healthcare just like everyone needs water and food. If they want to survive anyway. Even if the healthcare merely consisted of regular checkups and vaccines it would still be required to survive.

        1. Bad analogy. Yes, everyone will eventually need healthcare if they don’t die first. But no, they don’t need it from one source.

        2. Like the other liberty-phobes who post here, you need to read more, too, Godzilla. Like a good book on logic or economics. Want to show us logically why people have a “right” to healthcare? Keeping in mind that if people have a right to it, other people have a duty to provide for it. Please explain logically (i.e., without the Argument from Pity) why you have a right to force us to provide healthcare to others,

        3. Except that “health insurance” shouldn’t need to conver routine checkups and vaccines. The conflation of “health insurance” with “preventive measures” has combined with the evils of restricted inter-state commerce and employment entanglement to put us into this predicament to begin with.

          A person shouldn’t need to wait 3-5 weeks and have a job to be able to afford to see a doctor for a routine check on their weight, BP, etc. My “insurance mandated annual exam” took a 3-5 week wait to get an appointment, I sat in a waiting room and then an exam room for a combined 45 minutes, and then I spent all of maybe 6 minutes with a Nurse Practitioner, and it cost me a $25 co-pay on top of the $80-90 they would be milking out of BlueCross.

          I can call up a private company for a physical to maintain my CDL/FAA qualification and get an appointment within a week. When I arrive, I will not only wait less time to see a nurse, but I will also get a more thorough physical exam, and pay significantly less overall for the product.

          In fact, if I didn’t think that my doctor would drop me from his client list (and if I wasn’t already paying through the nose for “health care coverage” every month), I would only ever use the private Medical Exam company for all of my routine annual physicals, and skip “my doctor” altogether for anything other than an emergency.

  8. Now one possibility that–thank goodness–we have historically rejected in the United States is the idea that certain people should just feel a moral obligation to die for the good of society. You do hear this sometimes–that some people should voluntarily forgo life-extending treatment for the “good of society”–and it sends chills down my spine. This is essentially the Maoist approach.

    This is exactly what Jim wants. Obamacare’s policies will make it a reality. He won’t admit it, but because he is getting cheap health insurance, then it is okay for millions of others to go without. And without insurance, many will not get the treatment they need.

  9. Almost right. Look under the central planning cover and you have the self anointed elites. What they have successfully done is wimpify everyone else. Anyone opposing them is immediately classified an extremist nutcase and it doesn’t help that real nutcases abound (but all seem to turn out to be leftist nutcases.)

    I want Ted Nugent for vice president. Allen West is more qualified, but either is the attack dog we’ve been missing.

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