Comments on: With a Drum Roll…Introducing Socialist Gray Sasser

By: Neo-Malthus

Neo-Malthus — Fri, 05 Oct 2007 16:59:22 +0000

“Gray Sasser is apparently reading a different Constitution than the one I have access to - the one lacking the amendment confirming lifelong health care as an absolute right. . .
So let’s not stop with his murky sense of morality, or his complete lack of respect and knowledge for the United States Constitution (it’s a short, easy read - come on, please).”

So, I guess this means you also believe that Social Security and Medicare are unconstitutional, and that we had a socialist revolution in 1937?

By: Sean Braisted

Sean Braisted — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:09:42 +0000

Is that really the cause for the higher costs? People going to the doctor because of the sniffles? Or is it people going to the hospital after 20 years of living an unhealthy life, with few if any annual checkups, and expecting the doctors to fix them all at once?

Knowing what we do, those of us years from retirement age should expect nothing at all from the government to cover us for our failure to adequately plan.

Perhaps we shouldn’t, but people will. Being a moral nation, we aren’t going to sit by and say, “sucks to be you,” when poor people (or people who didn’t adequately plan) are dying from treatable diseases or medical conditions. We step in, and that is the whole issue, Health Care does not fit neatly into the market because emotion plays so heavily into the decisions being made.

People will mortgage their lives away to see their spouses and kids survive from treatable, but highly expensive, diseases. In terms of elderly parents, in a cold rational pros/cons world, many would have treatment stopped long before they currently do, as the costs of treatment outweigh the benefits. But do we, as individuals or especially as family members, make decisions based on rationality, or sentimentality?

There is not equal power between supply and demand in the health care market. The demand side is at the mercy of what the doctors tell them because of a general lack of knowledge about the product being offered. Most people, if the doctor tells them to get an MRI just to be on the safe side, will agree even if the costs are high, because failure to do so could result in the death of you or a loved one. There is no guarantee that services rendered will be of any benefit, except for the doctors word.

While there surely are market solutions to some of the health care problems (for instance smaller clinics for lesser problems), to blindly rely solely on Adam Smith’s theories to deal with this problem, is counter to the principles of morality that govern our society along with the principles of capitalism.

By: Nathan Moore

Nathan Moore — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 13:21:00 +0000

I am simply advocating that a market exist - that consumers and providers are connected in a meaningful way to preserve incentives and maintain competitive pricing. Prices are increasing because there is no check on demand, whether by need or price. A perceived unlimited government purse only exacerbates the problem.

Besides, nowadays there are so many ways to prepare for medical expenses. For instance, tax deductible investments such as health savings accounts, which are the longterm solutions. Knowing what we do, those of us years from retirement age should expect nothing at all from the government to cover us for our failure to adequately plan.

By: Sean Braisted

Sean Braisted — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 00:14:56 +0000

The true free market solution would be to abandon Medicare, and allow health insurance providers to drop elderly patients after a certain amount is spent. Then, instead of spending thousands of dollars to prolong a less valuable life (value denoted by their contributions to the blessed Market) they’ll die naturally as they did back in the good ol’ days in the 1800s.

In Adam Smith’s name we pray.