Socialized Medicine - Who has it - What do you think?

OK, what was that point?

 

I can't agree.

A presumption that I cannot agree with, either.

Which is why one key reason I say that you are a market-anarchist, which is by definition an absolutist philosophy.

As market-anarchy is an absolutist philosophy, it is manichean - it sees the world in absolutes of "good" and "bad." Hence, any idea that falls outside of the pure philosophy of market-anarchy is bad, untenable. Hence my usage here. Not based on emotional appeals, but rather a statement of facts.

A false analogy, since social constructs do not have the niceties of zero-sum conclusion that mathematics does. Much like saying that since the second law of thermodynamics exists, society necessarily devolves to chaos. A poor and unsupportable analogy. Market-anarchism is manichean, as I said - the free market on one end, an absolute good, and state intervention into the free market, on the other end, an absolute evil. "Immoral," to use your word.

I for one, have never argued we have had a free market in America.

Etc.

In fact, an area of agreement - we both conclude what you would call corporatism respecting our economic model, particularly, historically speaking, at the inception of industrialization.

Again, there isn't a need to instruct on what does or doesn't constitute free markets, capitalism, etc. You really would do well, Guerilla, to drop the presumption you're speaking to a community of lesser informed people.

Precisely why I say that an ideological adherence to an absolutist philosophy doesn't do well when applied to the complexities of the real world. Additionally, though you've posed this modelling method before - "going back in time," presumably, a better time - it doesn't work precisely because the world of 2008 so clearly differs from the world of 1898.

Again, doctors and patients can deal direct. You and I are free to forego insurance and pay on a fee basis for all medical care. Under the current system, insurance carriers push billables, and not care; treating disease, and not preventing its inception. In those countries with a different paradigm, Klein's examples (for example), healthcare that mixes some measure of private enterprise with national coverage has worked quite well. To argue this, as we will be wont to do for endless cycles, is to rely on differing statistics, I guess.

I know that one of your essential problems with law, as a construct, is that it is retroactive - it "doesn't stop crime," just punishes wrongdoers. The same logic applies here - in the case of my friend, if he "depended on the market," he would have died. Presumably, word would have gotten around, and his carrier would eventually be "punished" by market backlash, after some period of discovery, and countercycles of advertising, informed choice, etc.

Much the same argument has been applied respecting child labor laws, and a host of other ills affecting millions: "the market would eventually have cured the problem, without regulation - just give it time." I guess it comes down to a normative choice. I am not willing to allow countless, needless deaths, in order to effect a "market cure."

This by definition is manicheanism, as I have said. Free market is absolute good, and in a zero-sum deathmatch, state intervention is absolute bad. I would argue it is possible to have elements of both that arrive at a solution that is better than either can come up in a theoretical vacuum.

Again, well, you know.

At the end of the day, again, we decide if we are a nation of pure individualism, or a community, to some extent, where our individual needs are balanced against the needs of others. I know where I stand:

And I believe I know where Guerilla stands (by the way - I am not equating his idea of individualism with the above paragraph. The above paragraph speaks more to what I have seen in neoconservatism, not Rothbardian libertarianism). Our views here are consistent with those underlying philosophies.

 

By going to single payer, you limit choice. You limit choice by who is covered under government single payer care, new services, or natural medicine services are not covered, because there is no one in Washington to lobby for them. Likewise, you don't free up the FDA death grip on prescription drugs, or the roadblocks against cheaper, generic drugs. Under single payer, wages for medical professional become capped, and service is not allocated based on real demand, but perceived demand, which mis-allocates resources and creates shortages.

The system is rotten to the core with corrupt government intervention. More government is not the answer. The terms of service must be returned to the hands of the patients, of the insured. They have to regain control of their health decisions, not outsourcing or deferring to politicians in Washington who take money from every insurance, drug and education association to maintain the status quo of corporate profit at the expense of quality care.

As far as profit, advertising, overheads etc., it seems to me you have an issue with capitalistic market activity. I do not. I was going to write out a large defense of capitalism, and then realized it is not only offtopic for this thread, but based on our prior discussions, likely to fall on deaf ears, as you haven't shown much interest in considering classic liberal viewpoints.

Now if you are genuinely interested, I would be happy to invest the time in the discussion. But not merely as an exercise that takes away from other activities I am pursuing. I already spend an enormous amount of time on this forum debating and arguing, most of the time is unproductive, because there are not many people committed to learning and challenging what they know.

We can agree on a couple points. The medical industry turns an unreasonable profit, and operates inefficiently, and does not fulfill market demand. It does this with the power of regulation and government intervention. You feel that more government can eliminate profit (which is basically communism) rather than less government allowing the natural market forces of creativity and competition to drive prices down naturally.

The difference comes, where I believe that profit is the economic incentive to work hard, gain skills and a reward for providing what you customers want. It's vital to the human experience. Without government intervention, people will decide how much profit is tolerable, what services are required etc. Choice, and control in the hands of the consumer.

Hell, under a free market, we might even see the return of the charity hospital, which is certainly a much more moral way of helping the disadvantaged, than taxation.

As mentioned earlier in this thread, and unfortunately many people don't understand basic supply/demand economics, the government subsidizes and pumps money into Medicine and Health Care. These two areas are degrading in performance, but increasing in cost. This is actually anti-market, in that it is unnatural in a free market to pay more and get less, but it can happen, when government skews the market place by raising prices artificially.

 

I will end up replying to the rest of your post, but that is contingent upon hopefully reaching an understanding.

Are you saying then that you agree with my definitions of capitalism vs. socialism, and my definition of a free market?

Because prior to your response, it was my understanding that we had a fundamental difference of opinion on those definitions. Depending on where you are on this (I couldn't derive for sure from your last post), dictates where the discussion goes forward, because it is very difficult to offer a defense or proposal of free markets and capitalism, if the terms are not universally understood and their definition agree upon.

Thanks in advance.

 

I've never held otherwise:

As conceptualized, a free market, the "invisible hand," is an obvious thing - it is something which moves without any state intervention whatsoever.

There has never been a pure form of capitalism in the world.

Nor should there be.

These are my views, and I have held these consistently throughout my participation on this forum.

Does this help?

 

Not really.

Free markets and capitalism are not the same thing.

That's an interesting statement. Probably worthy of a whole new thread.

 

No, but in the context of this thread, it is free markets and capitalist enterprise we are discussing. We can continue to play semantic games, or at some point, you can address my good faith reply to your post, which you specifically requested.

Not really, since this is precisely what I am discussing in this thread, and this thread is as good a place as any other duplicate thread.

In this same vein, I will repeat:

I see that Rob is this moment around these parts, so as you seemed to be having difficulty getting in touch with him to create another thread on the topics we are discussing, now would probably be a good time to create that duplicate thread. Or, you can deal with existing threads. Your call.

 

I don't see it as a semantic game. Free markets require capitalism, but capitalism does not require a free market. And I feel that there has been some confusion when the word capitalist, capitalism is being used.

So it's important to work that out. Because it's difficult to address what you wrote, if we're not using the same language for the same meanings.

I'm kinda lost on this now. You do, or you do not agree with my definitions of free market and capitalism? If possible a yea or nay would probably help advance the discussion quickly.

Well, I'm interested in defending free market health care here, not providing broader economic discussions that probably warrant a new thread. As much as I am sure threads filled with guerilla/npt posts are thrilling and wonderful, the feedback I have received is that confining our discussions where appropriate and not trampling other's threads is considered much more desirable.

Cool, I'll probably message him tonight or tomorrow. He musst have just got back today! Thanks!

 

Uh, yep. A discussion on free markets, capitalism, and national health care options that encompass a discussion of these ideas do not belong in a thread entitled "socialized medicine - who has it? What do you think?" Got it - man, pretty confused on that.

I'm sorry - I replied in response to a coupla' post I thought I saw on this thread:

and since I addressed that particular post, line by line, I thought you, uh, meant what you wrote.

Guess that means unless you happen to disagree; then it, uh, belongs in a new thread?

Glad game playing is a thing of the past.

 

Looking for a response to this please.

 

I'm sorry, missed it, as you asked for a response to several things, received them, and ran to something else. Is there a reason you are protesting about so many things, getting answers, and then playing semantic games in moving away from the original questions?

Sigh...so now we're onto semantics regarding free markets and capitalism? Forgive me, but this was you, just one post back, was it not?

To this newest round of questions, I don't know that you've provided either a definition of the free market or capitalism, and I wouldn't care if you did, as I am quite comfortable with my definitions of both.

 

NPT, unless I am missing it, I'm just looking for a yes, or a no. if it's not too much trouble, could you reply with a yes or a no, or link me to where you said yes or no.

Please see my 11:15 AM post. I am still looking for a definitive yes or no answer. You do agree with my definitions, or you do not? That's pretty much all I have been asking for, over and over this afternoon.

A yes, or a no. Then I can address your longer response previous.

Thanks!

 

You're again asking if I agree with "your" definition of both. I don't know you're definition of both. I have provided, in response to your (latter day) request:

But, enough of this. One, pretty testy for a guy who raised an unholy stink in another thread, only to run for cover for over a week, and who has yet to answer, to demand a "yes" or "no" to anything; two, you asked for a detailed reply to your after-the-fact question, and once you received that reply, you now move onto an afternoon of semantic cavils.

Waste of time. As usual. Tell you what - I'm still waiting on an aged reply from over a week ago, and I'm waiting on a no-nonsense reply to the answers provided to your vociferous requests:

Etc. When you're done playing games, let me know, by posting so here. Until then, continue to whistle in the wind.

 

This is incorrect. You clearly disagreed with my "instructing you" with my definitions, as quoted and responded here.

But you're right, I'm tired of wasting time and playing games with you. I will respond to your post in it's entirety later this evening, taking the assumption that you do agree with my definitions.

 

Good lord, man. How many rounds of argument over who defined what? Here's a clue: I DON'T GIVE A DAMN. I'm quite comfortable with what I know respecting free markets, capitalism, indeed most houses of thought in political economics; as well, I am quite comfortable with my assessment of your points.

I was speaking, then, to your massively ill-placed habit of speaking to others here as if they were somehow a class below and apart from you in knowledge and intellect, something I find laughably ridiculous, to be brutally honest. Now that you have posted yet another vacuous post, in essence, a Clintonian niggling over what "is" "is," here's a further clue: don't bother. I have better things to do than play in empty fields of air with an ideologue who can't perform anything other than weakly conceived parlor tricks for a marginal audience.

 

Actually, that you continue to stalk me on the forums, indicates you do give a lot of "damn". Now, I think I have sufficiently proven your dishonesty this afternoon.

I hope so. Because I will continue educating you on free markets as the most moral, efficient and progressive choice.

Oh yes, it was another attempt at an Ad Hom, just as this ^ quote is. However, it clearly shows your dishonesty, when you claim that you do not know my definitions.

Considering you claim a "line by line" response, surely you have audited this mass of lines and understood them well enough to make the Ad Hom.

I don't really believe you have better things to do. As you have for months, you will consistently stalk, harass and quote me. It's who you are. It's what you do.

 

Very, very sad, Guerilla, if this is the case, that you would supplant an honest self-evaluation of the worthiness of your views, or the manner in which you bring them forward, with what you have constructed in the limited prism of your mind. Alternatively, very sad, to me, that if you do know what you are doing, you believe convincing 2 or 3 gullible people on DP amounts to some kind of ontological boost.

On this thread, I have engaged, to this extent, as based on the semblance of reasonableness you exhibited in one post (edited after the fact to your usual), I thought there might be the possibility for a useful exchange. You asked for answers to your positions, and you received them in the spirit of honest debate and good faith. Since then, it has been a circus of your making to dissemble and divert. As usual.

Reflect on this. And the only one that can help you to improve on them is yourself, Guerilla.

 

Well, that is why St. vBulletin made the quote button!

Was going to source this, but I'll pass. I don't care what people understand, as long as I can explain it well and correct misperceptions.

Which is an Ad Hom. It is irrelevant to the discussion. What is relevant are my views on the subject, and the veracity of those views.

Again, this is an Ad Hominem. An Argument against the man (Guerilla). What I am, what you chose to call that, or how you define my views are irrelevant to the quality of my argument.

Right, but I think you're using manichean incorrectly here, not that it is relevant at all. There is a "more good" and a "less good". Free markets, are actually amoral, in that all manner of choices, good and bad can occur.

The morality, comes from the unfettered free choice of the individual. If you believe, people have self-ownership, and they are most if not completely responsible for their own health, then I cannot fathom a principled opposition to free market choices available to all consumers. To argue otherwise, might indicate,

1) That people do not own themselves
2) That freedom of the maximum number of choices is a negative
3) That someone else is better suited to manage your health than you are

I'd be interested to read a rebuttal to those points.

I will say this about your claim to my argument or position being manichean. Can you truly be "free" if you are not "completely free"? Or rather, does the word free denote sovereign choices, or a gray area of some sovereign choice?

I don't really know, although I would be tempted to say that freedom is a zero sum game. It is impossible to be both free or enslaved. And while enslavement may be partial, freedom (in my mind) must be absolute.

And I never argued that you did. This point seems out of place, and irrelevant. That said...

A truly free market in America? Absolutely not. You can only have a truly free market, in the absence of the state, uncoerced voluntary exchange and strict observance of contract.

However, in the past, with a smaller state, less taxation, less regulation, the state and it's economy was significantly more free market.

The internet fulfills the first two but lacks the latter, for now. It is probably the best example of a free market we have ever had. If you do business online and offline, you know how much cheaper and easier it is to do business online. And as a consumer, you can score more free goods, from a wider variety of vendors, while communicating at a level unmatched by telephone, and finding an enormous amount of entertainment and knowledge archived from around the world.

While it's great we agree upon this, I don't see the value in quoting yourself. I'm not interest in quotes without source links to put them into context.

No disrespect to anyone, but Nate has been the only other person in this thread to pickup on free markets in a substantial way. Obviously it peaked Kaethy's interest, and firegirl seems interested in the notion. But generally, I have seen that most people seem to holdout the idea that a free market involves some sort of government intervention or regulation. Which is of course, not free market.

It is interesting that you edited out my definitions of capitalism and socialism. I take it however you will not dispute them.

So in this regard, I find it odd that capitalism has been painted as undesirable unless you do not believe that individuals are entitled to the fruits of their labor.

This ^^ is why I questioned the free market knowledge being brought to bear by others and specifically, yourself. An anarchist's unbridled capitalism is no different than just saying "capitalism". If you look at the amount of commerce, in a relatively free market atmosphere, is occurring on the web, then then I don't think the notion of private ownership of the means of production has been rejected by many.

What complexities?

Why doesn't it work? Or specifically, what differences keep it from working?

Attacking the "back in time" part of my post, is an appeal to ignorance IMO. The "past" is not so much relevant as being behind us, as it was a period where we had working health care WITHOUT insurance or massive government intervention. Whether it was better or not was never a question, but that it shows a different model, that is compatible with free market ideology. And thus wholly relevant to progression of the discussion.

Sure patients and doctors can deal direct. However, malpractice law compromises that. Medicare compromises that. Regulation compromises that. The FDA compromises that.

The notion that you can have a partially free market is false. A partially free market frequently is corporatism. The regulatory environment restricts competition, and in some respects, a pseudo public/private system means that free enterprise has to compete with government, which has the power of judicial fiat, and a near limitless purse Public/private is a decaying state of socialism. You see this in countries with socialized care. They cannot efficiently allocate resources, so they seek to recruit entrepreneurs to take away the top end of the state burden, the "complainers" so to speak.

How do you make that claim? His case may have been resolved in 10 minutes. You're arguing that free market contract courts would take longer to resolve an issue like this than the existing system? Even with the reduction in laws, overhead and likely waiting lists to have cases heard? Puleeeeeze.

Contract law is not very subjective. It's fairly cut and dry stuff, particular where precedent exists.

That said, the company he was insured with, may not have been so disreputable without the governmental clout it has through lobbying and regulation, because it would have to sustain itself in the free market through service, reputation and price.

But the worst part of socialized care, are the waits (shortages). See my high school libertarian post up thread about dissatisfaction with the wait times for critical care. Unfortunately, although he would be authorized for state paid care under such a system, he might die on a waiting list as not enough resources are available under any socialist system (see Mises).

You're not God. Or Supreme Being of the Universe. It's not up to you.

The market doesn't cure problems per se. The market allows for freedom of choices. People have the right to make good and bad decisions. And they have to live with their consequences.

If you believe each person is sovereign, and has the right to determine their own level of health care, their own provider, the drugs they choose to take, treatments and operations they will undergo, then you have to be for a free market in medicine.

I addressed this up post.

It's very simple. In order to have a less than fully free market, you have to cede some sovereignty. Who is noble enough to wield that collective yielded sovereignty? And can they assume such sovereignty without voluntary consent?

The path to improvement for the circumstances of all consumers, young and old, rich and poor, is through free individual choices.

Now that is manichean.

I believe we can be a nation of collective individual choices, creating a harmony of freedom, where individual needs are decided by individuals, not bureaucrats or corporate planners. The needs of others can be a VOLUNTARY choice to partake, with charity replacing government wealth confiscation and redistribution by coercive force.

You're entitled to be a nationalist, or a socialist, or a communist, or anything you want. A free market allows you to live, collaborate and choose as you wish. However, you have no right to impose systems on me that I do not consent to, and that is the fundamental truth and goodness of a free market.

I'm not Rothbardian. I think he was an amazing and rigorous theoretician that history has forgotten (or rather the establishment has buried), but Mises speaks more to a practical world where the struggle for freedom is eternal.

Where man cannot resist the urges to control others (statism) and use that dangerous tool for good, which always ultimately ends in failure.

 

Socialized medicine rocks!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/a...drawn-paid-privately-life-extending-drug.html

Private insurance has its problems; but at the very least you have the option to pay for medicine and treatment out of your own pocket.

 

People in the US die all the time for lack of insurance coverage and the means to pay directly. I don't doubt that the UK system has it's problems. But that does not in itself justify our not trying to come up with a better plan to cover everyone here in the US. Are you saying the US is not capable of designing a system that will work?

Currently people really do not have the option of paying out of pocket. Try going for an MRI for example, that will cost over $1000 bucks, and they simply won't give you the test if you don't have insurance or put your money on the counter. And that's just one test in a series that you'll need if you've got something going on.