Comments on: Single payer health care = death panels

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 15:19:50 +0000

GregK,

Maybe Brent is right, medicare does cost 10x what it was projected to cost, even in constant dollars:

http://jec.senate.gov/republicans/public/_files/Are_Health_Care_Reform_Cost_Estimates_Reliable__July_31_2009.pdf

But, deficits are _already_ increasing at an exponential rate, what’s beyond exponential?

By: GregK

GregK — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 14:59:36 +0000

Brent — if you’re right, then we’re headed for deficits that expand at an exponential rate.

By: Brent

Brent — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 14:39:53 +0000

Greg, I think you are flat wrong about rationing. The government will simply spend with the assumption there is infinite money (which is what they do in all other areas).

Take the “rationing” of food stamps as an example: I do have a relative on food stamps. This relative uses the stamps to purchase endless steaks and other “cut-above” meals. I can’t afford to eat with such opulence. Again, rather than ration the government chooses to act as if money is infinite.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 21:00:33 +0000

You know, all this market competition is inherently wasteful and unproductive. If there were only one soap company, one TV and radio station, one Newspaper, one publisher, one car company (actually, we’re well on our way to that), one Beer brewer, etc. things would be ever so more efficient.

You’re right about allocating food. We should begin there immediately. Everyone should get Government Standard food rations daily (no wasteful hording allowed).

No money wasted on Marketing and economies of scale would shoot through the roof.

Why give people a choice when a panel of Scientists can come up with what’s best for everyone?

By: GregK

GregK — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 20:47:51 +0000

The key word here is “presumably.” The doctors may have had a reason to do a second cat scan. And apparently the insurance company agreed to pay for it. It’s not as if doctors can do anything they like and insurance has to pay.

But you’re right that in a market-based system, people do what makes the most money, which is what I said. If they make more money by keeping the rich old guy alive for another week, they do that rather than spend their time on the poor.

I don’t get the point about the Fox news graph. You can chart any two things against each other. So what?

And who says Fox news is “fearmongering” or lying? Only the extreme left, which is at least as guilty.

Liberals are used to having the media as their own little sandbox and are all upset that somebody else’s cat has come to crap in it.

By: John Krehbiel

John Krehbiel — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 20:00:04 +0000

Just Tuesday, Mom told me that when the doctor saw Dad recently they did another CAT scan. She told them that he had just had a CAT scan a couple of days earlier, and she had a copy of the results in the car. By the time she got back from the car, they had already done another, presumably unnecessary, expensive, and (at least slightly) dangerous test.

The reason? The market. Hospitals are paid according to what procedures they do. When resources are scarce, they do what pays them the best.

Allocating resources does not mean that people will be killed, any more than allocating food inevitably leads to starvation.

BTW, did you see this? It looks like Fox profits from the fearmongering and outrageous lying, but they’re giving the Republican party a bloody nose in the process.

It’s really looking like the marginal notes on that legendary sermon- “Weak point here, talk louder.”