This article irks me, not because I disagree with it (I do), but because it misrepresents the position it attacks. It claims to set up a balanced view of its opposition, but then hamstrings this view by only considering a tiny piece of it.
The author dismiss everyone who disagrees with him as "privileged" and wanting to "benefit from your fear". This is ridiculous and insulting. There are countless people who advocate the free market, not to entrench their position, but rather to give them a fighting chance against the existing economic hegemony in the first place. The "truly privileged" often don't want a free market, because the truly privileged are benefiting from the inherent inequality in a restricted market. This is obviously not true for everyone - but look at our recent bailouts of banks and car manufacturers. Do you think they would rather have a free market that would force them to sink or swim based on their own efficiency? Hell no! They would be out of business by now, if it weren't for the government using the power to kill peculiar to the government to coerce citizens into giving their money to mismanaged banks and manufacturers, so they could reap the wealth that comes with taking risk and offload all that risk onto everyone. (This, of course, ignores the fact that much of the mismanagement, particularly of the banks, was forced upon them by government regulation in the first place. For more information, I recommend Thomas Sowell's The Housing Boom and Bust. http://www.amazon.com/Housing-Boom-Bust-Revised/dp/B004I1JQ9... - not an affiliate link.)
I understand that he probably doesn't intend to defend the bailouts (though I consider them, or something like them, inevitable in a restricted market). But what he advocates is the same kind of thing - forcing people to pay for other people's risk (I understand that it's a very different scenario, because this risk is unavoidable, but in this limited aspect it's quite similar). His arguments make sense on the surface, and, indeed, perhaps universal health care does work better in a model that is already fundamentally broken (I seriously doubt this, but it's an argument for another time. But dismissing a free market argument without considering how a free market might actually work, assuming that it would operate without changing the rules that the current healthcare system works under, is setting up a straw man and triumphantly knocking him down.
You have to look deeper than just private healthcare insurance. When I argue for free markets, I don't just argue for free market insurance. Why is healthcare so expensive? Particularly when hospitals are usually built and funded by the government anyway? Why do we need health insurance to avoid going bankrupt?
A firm that began offering the same healthcare at lower prices would be overflowing with customers (the current hospitals, which have exorbitant prices, already are). So why doesn't anybody do that? First, because of the litigatory nightmare that is the modern healthcare system that, because of an absurdly low standard for malpractice suits (which are fine in principle, I admit) require doctors and hospitals to pay enormous amounts in malpractice insurance. Second, the restrictive and state-controlled medical licensing scheme, which drives the price of medical education through the roof. Third, the tremendous amount of regulation surrounding healthcare itself.
You may become indignant at this point, saying that total deregulation of the healthcare market is nonsense and poppycock, and that, while deregulation may drive many prices down so low as to be generally affordable without health insurance, there will still be some situations that would still be expensive enough to ruin most people. First, private licensing would still be available. The boards and organizations that already exist to license healthcare would still exist, they just wouldn't be controlled by the government, so you could work outside of them, allowing for more affordable healthcare in less restrictive licensing schemes. Clear malpractice and fraud would still be crimes, of course. To address the second objection, private insurance would still be available for those disastrous times, but it would be far cheaper because the frequency of bank-busting medical treatment would be vastly lowered. It would be affordable to pay for your own health insurance, rather than using an employer's, making it easier to start your own business. And that business would be started in an environment free of government-mandated monopolies (by far and away the most common form - look at the problems with Uber and Lyft), inconsistent and restrictive licensing schemes, and other harmful and difficult-to-avoid forms of regulation.
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My point in this long comment isn't really to convince anyone of my economic opinions. My point is simply that hand-waving my arguments away without considering their actual implications and what I actually advocate is not an argument at all. I'd love to engage in debate, but this is impossible if he's unwilling to listen to my arguments.
The author dismiss everyone who disagrees with him as "privileged" and wanting to "benefit from your fear". This is ridiculous and insulting. There are countless people who advocate the free market, not to entrench their position, but rather to give them a fighting chance against the existing economic hegemony in the first place. The "truly privileged" often don't want a free market, because the truly privileged are benefiting from the inherent inequality in a restricted market. This is obviously not true for everyone - but look at our recent bailouts of banks and car manufacturers. Do you think they would rather have a free market that would force them to sink or swim based on their own efficiency? Hell no! They would be out of business by now, if it weren't for the government using the power to kill peculiar to the government to coerce citizens into giving their money to mismanaged banks and manufacturers, so they could reap the wealth that comes with taking risk and offload all that risk onto everyone. (This, of course, ignores the fact that much of the mismanagement, particularly of the banks, was forced upon them by government regulation in the first place. For more information, I recommend Thomas Sowell's The Housing Boom and Bust. http://www.amazon.com/Housing-Boom-Bust-Revised/dp/B004I1JQ9... - not an affiliate link.)
I understand that he probably doesn't intend to defend the bailouts (though I consider them, or something like them, inevitable in a restricted market). But what he advocates is the same kind of thing - forcing people to pay for other people's risk (I understand that it's a very different scenario, because this risk is unavoidable, but in this limited aspect it's quite similar). His arguments make sense on the surface, and, indeed, perhaps universal health care does work better in a model that is already fundamentally broken (I seriously doubt this, but it's an argument for another time. But dismissing a free market argument without considering how a free market might actually work, assuming that it would operate without changing the rules that the current healthcare system works under, is setting up a straw man and triumphantly knocking him down.
You have to look deeper than just private healthcare insurance. When I argue for free markets, I don't just argue for free market insurance. Why is healthcare so expensive? Particularly when hospitals are usually built and funded by the government anyway? Why do we need health insurance to avoid going bankrupt?
A firm that began offering the same healthcare at lower prices would be overflowing with customers (the current hospitals, which have exorbitant prices, already are). So why doesn't anybody do that? First, because of the litigatory nightmare that is the modern healthcare system that, because of an absurdly low standard for malpractice suits (which are fine in principle, I admit) require doctors and hospitals to pay enormous amounts in malpractice insurance. Second, the restrictive and state-controlled medical licensing scheme, which drives the price of medical education through the roof. Third, the tremendous amount of regulation surrounding healthcare itself.
You may become indignant at this point, saying that total deregulation of the healthcare market is nonsense and poppycock, and that, while deregulation may drive many prices down so low as to be generally affordable without health insurance, there will still be some situations that would still be expensive enough to ruin most people. First, private licensing would still be available. The boards and organizations that already exist to license healthcare would still exist, they just wouldn't be controlled by the government, so you could work outside of them, allowing for more affordable healthcare in less restrictive licensing schemes. Clear malpractice and fraud would still be crimes, of course. To address the second objection, private insurance would still be available for those disastrous times, but it would be far cheaper because the frequency of bank-busting medical treatment would be vastly lowered. It would be affordable to pay for your own health insurance, rather than using an employer's, making it easier to start your own business. And that business would be started in an environment free of government-mandated monopolies (by far and away the most common form - look at the problems with Uber and Lyft), inconsistent and restrictive licensing schemes, and other harmful and difficult-to-avoid forms of regulation.
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My point in this long comment isn't really to convince anyone of my economic opinions. My point is simply that hand-waving my arguments away without considering their actual implications and what I actually advocate is not an argument at all. I'd love to engage in debate, but this is impossible if he's unwilling to listen to my arguments.