Comments on: A Fourth Health-Care Question

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 04:08:00 +0000

I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don’t know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.

Margaret

http://lotterymegamillions.net

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 06:06:00 +0000

It isn’t for you or I to decide that everyone MUST value “optimum health” over all other consumption goals.

By: Anthony W. Orlando

Anthony W. Orlando — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 19:13:00 +0000

I agree with your first point. That was exactly what I was saying. I did not say that there was moral hazard with HSAs. I made the same point as you: moral hazard is part of the employer tax-deduction system created by the federal government during WWII.

To your second point, I’m defining “necessary and unnecessary” based on “evidence-based medicine.” It wasn’t a value judgment. People can cut back on some care and not experience worsening health, but other care (“necessary” was the word I used) is essential to maintaining optimal health. Consumers are bad at telling the difference.

Again, thanks for pushing back on these points!

By: Anthony W. Orlando

Anthony W. Orlando — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 19:08:00 +0000

Thanks again for the great feedback! I should point out that my proposed solution includes HSAs, so I am supportive of freer markets for at least part of the health care market. The answer to your final paragraph is that, even without the trouble of local monopolies, there would still be significant market failure (asymmetric information, moral hazard, and adverse selection).

I see your point about rationing. All I was saying was that both systems — either private insurance or government-run care — a third party determines what is “cost-effective” to cover, and you have to pay the rest. That latter part, of course, is rationed by price — which is to say, the consumer’s ability to pay.

By: mesaeconoguy

mesaeconoguy — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 04:24:00 +0000

“….providing for our own health-care needs in the same way that we provide for our own grocery needs, our own household-furniture needs, our own automobile-insurance needs, and many other of our needs?”

[Late] Answer:

Because government hasn’t interfered sufficiently in those markets (yet) to warrant this level of interference.

This is The Mob, writ large.

And not nearly as effective. At least La Cosa Nostra has cultural ethics, and are quite good businessmen. I prefer to do business with voluntary gangsters rather than government ones.

And they’ll give me a quick answer for “end of life care.”