On 12/18/2014 10:44 PM, 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List wrote:
*From:*meekerdb
*Sent:* Thursday, December 18, 2014 11:06 AM.
On 12/18/2014 10:16 AM, 'Chris de Morsella' via Everything List wrote:
*From:*[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>
[mailto:[email protected]] *On Behalf Of *Jason Resch
*Sent:* Wednesday, December 17, 2014 12:25 AM
On Tue, Dec 16, 2014 at 6:07 PM, meekerdb <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
On 12/16/2014 10:15 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
Hi Liz,
On Mon, Dec 15, 2014 at 7:51 PM, LizR <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
What is funny - as well as sad and frightening - is the number of
people here
who apparently don't believe in democracy, even in principle. Democracy
is the
idea that we can elect people to do things for everyone else (the NHS,
conservation, social security, infrastructure, regulations, police,
army science
etc etc).
All of the things you mention are run by unelected bureaucrats with long
careers, who see politicians come and go.
I highly recommend the British show "Yes, Prime Minister!" to learn
about this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmXzGI0XP7M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeF_o1Ss1NQ
Yet all I can see here is people saying that it doesn't work. I
think the
truth is that it can be hijacked and THEN it doesn't work. The NHS
(despite
everything) was one of the greatest achievements of the 20th
century, after
all. And it was introduced by a government because of its beliefs
and
principles.
The NHS is the sort of thing that should worry an Ecologist, because
it's based
on infinite growth. Both the European system (based on infinite
demographic
growth) and the Anglo (based on infinite economic growth). I also feel
that it
serves mostly to fix a problem created by the government itself in a
previous
regulatory wave. The barriers to competition in the practice of
healthcare are
so high that it becomes unaffordable without insurance or subsidy.
Health care isn't well regulated by competition because the consumer is ill
equipped
to judge the necessity or the quality of service and the most expensive
service
tends to a one-time event for the consumer.
Worse, the healthcare industry has gotten the US government to pass laws
making it
exempt from monopolistic practices, price fixing, charging people different
amounts
for the same service, forbidding reimportation of medicine, restricting the
number
of MRI machines in a given area. It's what leads to people being charged
$60,000 for
two bottles of anti-venom that cost $200, or be charged $9,000 for a few
stiches in
a finger. (these are real life examples
<http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=229605> and not exaggerations).
Experimental
clinics like The Surgery Center of Oklahoma, which cut out insurance
companies, and
publishes their prices are 5-10X cheaper
<http://reason.com/reasontv/2012/11/15/the-obamacare-revolt-oklahoma-doctors-fi>
than what other hospitals charge (and about equivalent to prices charged in
Japan
and India). If medical costs were this cheap, many people wouldn't need
insurance to
pay for all but the most catastrophic of illnesses.
If hospitals were required to adhere to the same anti-trust rules as any
other
business, to publish their prices and charge the same amount to everyone,
we would
see about 80% of the cost of healthcare evaporate overnight. It's a sad
state of
affairs when for every doctor in the country there are two people working
in the
medical insurance industry.
I agree with that statement. It is not just hospitals but the monopolies
that have
also been established on the practice of medicine and dentistry. Why do the
American
Medical Association (AMA), and American Dental Association (ADA) – both
private
(government sanctioned and enforced) guilds or trade organizations have
such power
and control over who can practice medicine; over how medicine can be
practiced?
>>Because when they didn't anybody could hang out a shingle and claim to be doctor and
there were quacks everywhere pushing patent medicine and bleeding people (literally).
Sure… but how does that justify giving a guild – e.g. the AMA – a monopoly over the
issue of licenses to practice medicine? Why not a state body for example. Why a monopoly
private trade association?
?? Medical licenses in the U.S. are issued by states.
MDs in the US make on average twice as much money as MDs in other OECD countries – such
as Germany -- for example.
In Germany, as I understand it, insurance companies bid to insure classes of workers and
they then negotiate to control doctors fees. Most of the OECD countries directly
regulate or pay health care fees. Of all the OECD countries the U.S. has the most
free-market system, and the most expensive health care. It shows the fallacy of the
libertarian dream. When everyone pursues self-interest the winners will be those who
form coalitions whose objective is to eliminate other coalitions.
The US system likes to bill itself as being free market, but it is in fact rather more
of a crony capitalist system run by and for the powerful vested interests. Our health
care system is a perfect example of just how inefficient and expensive crony capitalism
really is.
I think it falls between two stools by trying to be regulated capitalism. I would have
much preferred expanding Medicare to everyone, i.e. a single-payer system like France,
than Obamacare. But Obama had to have some powerful (i.e. moneyed) ally and he settled on
the health insurance industry.
Just because it is called free market doesn’t mean it actually bears any actual
resemblance to an actual free market. The US economy is an oligopoly where access to the
market is highly controlled and regulated – invariably to protect, favor and benefit the
vested interests. The Walton heirs net worth is an example of the social fabric trickle
down “free market” policies have actually resulted in. Since 1983, their net worth has
increased a staggering 6,700 percent; in 2013, the Walton family's net worth was $144.7
billion.
Your example though doesn't match your rhetoric. How was Walton's money not obtained by
using "the market"?
Brent
-Chris
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