A thought or two on the “right” to free health care
Whenever I hear someone insist that health care should be a right I wince. I am convinced that most people who make this assertion are dense, uninformed, or envious of the good health of others.
Health care is not the same as health, and receiving health care does result in freedom from illness, injury or pain. Health is dictated by a variety of factors which include genetic predisposition and life style choices. Having access to health care is part of a strategy to maintain health, but it is not a guarantee of good health, or a long life.
Health care is a service. It is provided by individuals. In that regard, it is not even vaguely similar to freedom of speech, the right to assembly or prohibitions regarding illegal search and seizure. Health care is essentially the dispensing of a skill, and often involves access to specialized facilities, medications, procedures and equipment, most of which were unavailable 50 years ago, but are available now as a result of a free market meeting the needs of its potential clients.
The delivery of healthcare is dependent upon the willingness of others to trade their time and talent for a fair compensation. Prior to Medicare, these charges were set pretty much by the marketplace. And at times these services were provided as charity. But in a practical sense, medical providers have to make sure that their fees will be adequate to maintain their practice, and still be affordable enough for their clients.
Of all the professions in the world, few involve as much preparation and sacrifice of time and money as medical practitioners. Once established, after a decade or more of schooling, doctors often have to repay student loans, pony up for expensive malpractice insurance (lawyers have to eat too), spend the rest of their professional life trying to remain current with the advancements of the medical profession, and pay for a staff devoted to making sure the medical provider is in compliance with government regulations. They also have to endure being slandered by President Obama (the commander in chief of community organizing). This man, who has almost no private sector job experience, and whose wife received copious compensation as a non-medical staff member in a hospital, apparently believes that the indigent have a RIGHT to the services of others.
But what this implies is that people have the right to others peoples’ time and talent and the wealth they generate.
The central issue is access. We already have the best health care delivery. Survival rates for cancer and heart disease are greater in the United States than in any other country in the world. What is remarkable about this is that we also have some of the worst health habits in the world too. From diet to excesses in our activity (some get no exercise, others push beyond the limits of the body), we are a nation of indulgence. In our country food is plentiful and cheap. Many meals are prepared out of a can, or obtained at restaurants. The snack isle is almost as large as the produce section. We are a wealthy society, and that wealth has had consequences. Even the “poor” have a weight problem.
Is there a case for tax payer funded health care? Certainly. There are some who are unable to survive in a free market economy because they lack the physical or intellectual resources to compete. It is for those that the welfare system should have been established. But it has become all too inclusive, and undermined the competitive instinct, and resulted in a relentless cycle of poverty. Since the advent of the “Great Society” welfare system, the very communities that were targeted for attention have been utterly destroyed. Anyone with an ounce of common sense, which apparently excludes liberal/progressives, would have been able to predict that dispensing money to dysfunctional families would result in more dysfunctional families. Rewarding irresponsible behavior gets you more of the same. The resulting breakdown of the traditional family, especially in minority communities, has brought about a condition of existence, but not upward mobility or prosperity. That is because individuals prosper when they create their own wealth, not when they are recipients of the wealth of others. Wealth is created when an individual trades his or her time and talent in exchange for buying power or capital. For Americans, wealth is created and voluntarily distributed in a competitive environment. And in competition, preparation is all important. Some choose to prepare, some don’t. Consequently, wealth differs in a competitive economy. Employers do not go into business to make employees rich, but to realize his dreams. If individuals expect big bucks from the boss, they must prove to him that they are worth it.
Since health care is available to those who can afford the services of the industry, one would conclude that it is the poor who are suffering. That would be wrong.
Cash assistance and Medicare eligible individuals, allegedly the poorest in our society, are usually the recipients of the most comprehensive healthcare available. But they don’t pay for it. The tax payer does. You see, there is no such thing as free healthcare. The doctor needs to get paid. He has expenses. Medicare is not free (and is going bankrupt). This is because, just like your Social Security contribution you had taken from your pay check, the politicians spent it on other promises made to you to purchase their re-election. In fact, these programs would have hit the wall sooner except for their unrealistic pricing, which was then subsidized by the health payments made in the private marketplace.
What the liberals have attempted to do is pit economic classes against each other. The implied message is simply this: If you do not possess something you want, it is because the rich guy has it and will not share and that is not fair. And for the progressive, “fairness” is what is important, not freedom and not justice. It is, for them, the government’s responsibility to ensure that everyone has a minimum standard of living. This has been tried before, and failed before. Can you say “Soviet Union”? Welfare states all ultimately fail because they destroy the competitive impulse, undermine productivity, and create an attitude of entitlement among the citizenry. Initial euphoria gives way to stagnation and then despair. The British national health care system is a prime example. Rationing, long waits, inefficiency and fewer positive outcomes characterize their government run system. Everybody has health care, but it is poorly allocated, and mediocre.
Improving access to health care involves wealth creation among the poor, and lowering the cost of health care delivery to all. Ironically, lowering healthcare coasts is probably the easier of the two. Repeal laws that prohibit purchasers from obtaining the policy coverage they desire across state lines, eliminate frivolous malpractice lawsuits, remove the price fixing of Medicare and Medicaid to reflect actual market costs, and permit deductions for all health related expenses. This strategy will encourage innovation and compel real competition. Competition fosters efficiency, and that usually benefits the consumer.
The fact that our liberal/progressive/statist friends don’t want to admit, or are actually too stupid to understand, is that a free market economy will always allocate resources more efficiently and out produce a command economy. All the good intentions and warm feelings of the progressive cannot overwhelm human nature or simple math.