All Posts Tagged With: "health care"
Walter Lippmann: The Impossibilities of Social Planning
At the beginning of the twentieth century, observed historian A. J. P. Taylor, a law-abiding Englishman’s conscious relations with the government were limited to his contacts with the post office and the policeman. He could live where he liked and as he liked, and if he wanted to travel abroad he could do so without [...]
21Sep2011 | Harold B. Jones Jr. | 2 comments | ContinuedMedical Consumers or Wards of the State?
Paul Krugman wants to know: “How did it become normal, or for that matter even acceptable, to refer to medical patients as ‘consumers’?” Let’s concede for argument’s sake there is something unattractive about viewing patients as consumers. Krugman writes, “Medical care, after all, is an area in which crucial decisions—life and death decisions—must be made. [...]
22Jun2011 | Sheldon Richman | 1 comment | ContinuedAffording It All
People who don’t understand — or don’t care about — economics say funny things.
10Jun2011 | Sheldon Richman | 24 comments | ContinuedCongress Can’t Repeal Economics
It’s raining! I don’t like it! Why hasn’t Congress passed the Good Weather Act and the Everybody Happy Act? Sound dumb? Why is it any dumber than a law called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which promises to cover more for less money? When Obamacare was debated, we free-market advocates insisted that no [...]
22Dec2010 | John Stossel | 13 comments | ContinuedAsk Not For Whom the Drug Tolls
“Fifty years ago, it made sense to assert that mental illnesses are not diseases, but it makes no sense to say so today. Debate about what counts as mental illness has been replaced by legislation about the medicalization and demedicalization of behavior. Old diseases such as homosexuality and hysteria disappear. New diseases such as gambling [...]
22Dec2010 | Wendy McElroy | 13 comments | ContinuedWell, Mr. Moore?
Cuba banned Michael Moore’s 2007 documentary, Sicko, because it painted such a “mythically” favourable picture of Cuba’s healthcare system that the authorities feared it could lead to a “popular backlash”, according to US diplomats in Havana. The revelation, contained in a confidential US embassy cable released by WikiLeaks , is surprising, given that the film [...]
18Dec2010 | Sheldon Richman | 8 comments | ContinuedDoctors Are Government Employees
Doctors speak frequently among themselves about problems in medicine: decreased collections; inability to spend more time with patients; difficulty getting consults from specialists, especially for Medicare/Medicaid patients; enormous time wasted with patients who aren’t really sick (sometimes they’re old and lonely; sometimes they’re unemployed with nothing else to do—visits to the doctor for the poor [...]
22Oct2010 | Theodore Levy | 4 comments | ContinuedProtecting America’s Health: The FDA, Business, and One Hundred Years of Regulation
George Stigler once compared regulating on the basis of corporate misdeeds to an audition at which the second singer is selected after only the first has sung. When it comes to food and health, Philip Hilts, a veteran medical reporter, runs the same sort of abbreviated audition. His latest book is an eminently readable, amply [...]
7Jul2010 | Sam Kazman | 1 comment | ContinuedCapital Letters
Don’t Let the Court Off the Hook To the Editor: As a former wartime draftee — the Korean War — I’m of two minds re Aeon J. Skoble’s “Neither Slavery Nor Involuntary Servitude” piece in your September issue (“It Just Ain’t So!). No question, he did a very good job of picking apart the operational [...]
6Jul2010 | FEE Admin | 1 comment | ContinuedOne Last Time: Markets Don’t Ration!
The Wall Street Journal takes Donald Berwick, likely the next Medicare chief, to task for saying, “The decision is not whether or not we will ration care—the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open. And right now, we are doing it blindly.” Fine. But then the editorial writer adds, “In fact, the [...]
27Apr2010 | Sheldon Richman | 1 comment | ContinuedDo We Really Want a Right to Health Care?
Do you have a right to health care? People want a right to health care because they think it will guarantee them the services they need. But might obtaining health care as a political right rather than a market commodity have a downside? The government cannot produce or purchase an infinite amount of health care. [...]
20Apr2010 | Theodore Levy | 4 comments | ContinuedGovernment: More Incompetent than Ever
Most intellectuals support big government, and millions of people depend on it. So why, with thousands of laws, millions of employees working to carry out those laws, and trillions of dollars spent, is it in trouble? The most popular big-government programs–like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid–are going broke. These entitlements account for more than half [...]
19Apr2010 | Jim Powell | 1 comment | ContinuedPositive Rights as Means Not Ends
Even though the House passed so-called “health care reform,” the debate over “entitlements” will not be going away. This is especially true if, as I believe, the bill makes things worse not better.
25Mar2010 | Steven Horwitz | 11 comments | ContinuedObamaCare and Unions
Last November 7, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 3962, crafted by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and whimsically titled the Affordable Health Care for America Act (AHCAA). It was the House’s version of ObamaCare. American labor unions, whether representing government- or private-sector workers, enthusiastically endorsed the measure. Yet most unions have been effective at securing good [...]
24Mar2010 | Charles W. Baird | 1 comment | ContinuedOpaque by Design
“The House and Senate plan to put together the final health care reform bill behind closed doors, according to an agreement by top Democrats.” That less-than-startling piece of news was delivered by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi back in January. She was at the White House when she said it, so it looks like it’s okay [...]
24Mar2010 | Sheldon Richman | 1 comment | ContinuedA Health Insurance Criminal Pleads His Case
If mandatory health insurance goes through, it will turn me into a criminal. I don’t have health insurance. I don’t want it. And I will refuse to buy it even though I can afford it. Before they lead me to the cell, perhaps the prisoner may be allowed to say a few words in his [...]
24Mar2010 | James L. Payne | 21 comments | ContinuedThe End of Medicine: Not With a Bang, But a Whimper
Social change can be revolutionary, sudden, and swift, but more commonly it moves at a glacial pace. Yet glaciers work great change, and great damage, given enough time. There has been much talk of people leaving the medical profession if government further bureaucratizes health care. But the odds are great that there won’t be any [...]
24Mar2010 | Theodore Levy | 6 comments | Continued-
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