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Sep 23, 2009

Comments

Diane O'Brien

Great video on the need health insurance reform!

Govtmule

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/health/policy/20view.html

I had a long conversation with my mom, a RN who has been at the Mayo Clinic for a couple of decades now and the question that kept coming up was the continuing increases in medical technology/practices and what that means for health care. Mankiw's piece in the NY Times covers it broadly - what is the correct cost for health care - no matter who pays for it (directly or indirectly).

I get the progressive position of lifting the level of care for all with taxes on the wealthiest but at what point does it become unsustainable? At what point does the system say no? When that point is reached is everyone cut off? Or do the wealthy still have additional access? So fairness really cannot be an outcome.
Why use economic wealth as a means for distributing health care (via taxes)? Why not tax intellectual wealth and make doctors and nurses work for free/less? Why are dollars more acceptable to take than time?

On a related note on possible alternative that we discussed to improve health care was to allow people who met annual health milestones to remain in the private system but if you fell below the curve (and therefore represent a higher risk) you would be moved into the public health system. Once in the public system there would be a strict ability to pay cost structure (progressive) - the incentive to spare the system of costs through optimal behavior would be good nudge. Still cuts against my libertarian grain but might satisfy both sides.

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