pmex
08-07-2009, 11:09 AM
1. The Medical Crisis and the Need for Radical Procapitalist Reform
For decades the cost of medical care has risen relative to prices in general and relative to people's incomes. Today [1994] a semi-private hospital room typically costs $1,000 to $1,500 per day, exclusive of all medical procedures, such as X-rays, surgery, or even a visit by one's physician. Basic room charges of $500 per day or more are routinely tripled just by the inclusion of normal hospital pharmacy and supplies charges (the cost of a Tylenol tablet can be as much as $20). And typically the cost of the various medical procedures is commensurate. In such conditions, people who are not exceptionally wealthy, who lack extensive medical insurance, or who fear losing the insurance they do have if they become unemployed, must dread the financial consequences of any serious illness almost as much as the illness itself. At the same time, no end to the rise in medical costs is in sight. Thus it is no wonder that a great clamor has arisen in favor of reform – radical reform – that will put an end to a situation that bears the earmarks of financial lunacy.
Such a reform has been proposed by the Clinton administration. The essence of its plan is to control the rise in medical costs by a combination of controlling the various prices charged by the providers of medical care and the kinds and quantities of medical care that they can provide. In the plainest language, the Clinton administration's proposed solution to the problem of ever rising medical costs is price controls and rationing. [This applies to all proposals for government-mandated cost controls, including, of course, those of the present, Obama administration. There is simply no way for the government to limit medical costs except by limiting the prices and/or kinds and quantities of medical care provided.]
I will have a great deal to say in criticism of the Clinton administration's proposal later on. Here I want to stress that I do not believe that the most important or fundamental objective that must be accomplished in connection with the Clinton plan is to explain why it should be rejected. It certainly should be rejected. But the mere rejection of the administration's proposal will serve only to maintain the status quo. The status quo with respect to medical care does not deserve to be preserved. It does bear the earmarks of financial lunacy. It does call for reform – for radical reform. The question is, what kind of radical reform?
For over a century, virtually all proposals for economic or social reform have been based on the thoroughly mistaken philosophical and theoretical foundations of Marxism, and have aimed at the ultimate achievement of a socialist society, in the belief that socialism represented the most rational and moral system of mankind's social organization. On the basis of this conviction, individual freedom was progressively restricted and the power of the state progressively enlarged. Individual freedom – laissez faire capitalism – was assumed to be a system of chaos and of the exploitation of the masses by the capitalists. The onslaught of the socialists (who in this country call themselves "liberals") – the step-by-step achievement of their political agenda – encountered virtually no philosophical resistance. Not surprisingly, again and again, the "liberals" defeated their ill-equipped conservative adversaries, who at most could only delay their advance. The victories of the "liberals" were inevitable because it was a battle of men with the seeming vision of a better world that could be achieved by means of intelligent human effort based on a body of ideas (however mistaken those ideas were), against men who, while they valued the relatively free world they saw around them, had no significant philosophical or theoretical knowledge of how to defend it.
In the last few years, some of the most profound and fundamental changes in the political and intellectual history of mankind have taken place. The philosophy of socialism and the economic theory of Marxism have been recognized as a blatant failure almost everywhere, and have been abandoned by tens of millions of former supporters. All over the world, the cry is heard "no more socialism!" One socialist regime after another has recognized the chaos and tyranny of socialism and has become dedicated to the achievement of a capitalist society. Thus, the intellectual base and the driving force of American "liberalism" has largely disintegrated.
Considered against this backdrop, the Clinton administration's proposal for the government's takeover of medical care in the United States appears as a ludicrous anachronism. It reads like the work of twentieth-century Rip Van Winkles who have been sleeping since the 1930s and who have not had a chance to read the newspapers. In effect, America's politicians and intellectuals who support the proposal are still riding a train that more intelligent people the world over have recognized can take them nowhere but to hell and have therefore jumped off.
In contrast, while the philosophy of Marx and Engels is dying, the philosophy of Locke and Jefferson, and Adam Smith, that is, the philosophy of individual freedom and capitalism underlying the American Revolution – the philosophy which, ironically enough, was the original meaning of the word liberalism – has been reborn. It has been reborn first and foremost at the hands of Ayn Rand in political philosophy and of Ludwig von Mises in economic theory, both of whom have enormously strengthened it. This philosophy of individual freedom, of the inviolability of individual rights, of the benevolent functioning of an economic system based on private ownership of the means of production and the profit motive – of capitalism – calls for a radically new political agenda. It calls for a political agenda that progressively rolls back the interference of the state and progressively enlarges the freedom of the individual. This is now what political philosophy and economic theory at their highest levels of development recognize to be the essential means of solving social and economic problems. Movement in this direction – in the direction of individual freedom from government interference – is henceforth to be regarded as the standard of what is to be considered progress in the realm of political action.
It is on the basis of this newly resurgent, radically different political philosophy and economic theory – this philosophy and theory of individual rights and capitalism – that I explain the causes of the present crisis in medical care, criticize the Clinton plan, and present the appropriate solution and how to achieve it.
More... (http://www.24hgold.com/english/contributor.aspx?rss=true&article=2248871304G10020&redirect=true&contributor=George+Reisman)
For decades the cost of medical care has risen relative to prices in general and relative to people's incomes. Today [1994] a semi-private hospital room typically costs $1,000 to $1,500 per day, exclusive of all medical procedures, such as X-rays, surgery, or even a visit by one's physician. Basic room charges of $500 per day or more are routinely tripled just by the inclusion of normal hospital pharmacy and supplies charges (the cost of a Tylenol tablet can be as much as $20). And typically the cost of the various medical procedures is commensurate. In such conditions, people who are not exceptionally wealthy, who lack extensive medical insurance, or who fear losing the insurance they do have if they become unemployed, must dread the financial consequences of any serious illness almost as much as the illness itself. At the same time, no end to the rise in medical costs is in sight. Thus it is no wonder that a great clamor has arisen in favor of reform – radical reform – that will put an end to a situation that bears the earmarks of financial lunacy.
Such a reform has been proposed by the Clinton administration. The essence of its plan is to control the rise in medical costs by a combination of controlling the various prices charged by the providers of medical care and the kinds and quantities of medical care that they can provide. In the plainest language, the Clinton administration's proposed solution to the problem of ever rising medical costs is price controls and rationing. [This applies to all proposals for government-mandated cost controls, including, of course, those of the present, Obama administration. There is simply no way for the government to limit medical costs except by limiting the prices and/or kinds and quantities of medical care provided.]
I will have a great deal to say in criticism of the Clinton administration's proposal later on. Here I want to stress that I do not believe that the most important or fundamental objective that must be accomplished in connection with the Clinton plan is to explain why it should be rejected. It certainly should be rejected. But the mere rejection of the administration's proposal will serve only to maintain the status quo. The status quo with respect to medical care does not deserve to be preserved. It does bear the earmarks of financial lunacy. It does call for reform – for radical reform. The question is, what kind of radical reform?
For over a century, virtually all proposals for economic or social reform have been based on the thoroughly mistaken philosophical and theoretical foundations of Marxism, and have aimed at the ultimate achievement of a socialist society, in the belief that socialism represented the most rational and moral system of mankind's social organization. On the basis of this conviction, individual freedom was progressively restricted and the power of the state progressively enlarged. Individual freedom – laissez faire capitalism – was assumed to be a system of chaos and of the exploitation of the masses by the capitalists. The onslaught of the socialists (who in this country call themselves "liberals") – the step-by-step achievement of their political agenda – encountered virtually no philosophical resistance. Not surprisingly, again and again, the "liberals" defeated their ill-equipped conservative adversaries, who at most could only delay their advance. The victories of the "liberals" were inevitable because it was a battle of men with the seeming vision of a better world that could be achieved by means of intelligent human effort based on a body of ideas (however mistaken those ideas were), against men who, while they valued the relatively free world they saw around them, had no significant philosophical or theoretical knowledge of how to defend it.
In the last few years, some of the most profound and fundamental changes in the political and intellectual history of mankind have taken place. The philosophy of socialism and the economic theory of Marxism have been recognized as a blatant failure almost everywhere, and have been abandoned by tens of millions of former supporters. All over the world, the cry is heard "no more socialism!" One socialist regime after another has recognized the chaos and tyranny of socialism and has become dedicated to the achievement of a capitalist society. Thus, the intellectual base and the driving force of American "liberalism" has largely disintegrated.
Considered against this backdrop, the Clinton administration's proposal for the government's takeover of medical care in the United States appears as a ludicrous anachronism. It reads like the work of twentieth-century Rip Van Winkles who have been sleeping since the 1930s and who have not had a chance to read the newspapers. In effect, America's politicians and intellectuals who support the proposal are still riding a train that more intelligent people the world over have recognized can take them nowhere but to hell and have therefore jumped off.
In contrast, while the philosophy of Marx and Engels is dying, the philosophy of Locke and Jefferson, and Adam Smith, that is, the philosophy of individual freedom and capitalism underlying the American Revolution – the philosophy which, ironically enough, was the original meaning of the word liberalism – has been reborn. It has been reborn first and foremost at the hands of Ayn Rand in political philosophy and of Ludwig von Mises in economic theory, both of whom have enormously strengthened it. This philosophy of individual freedom, of the inviolability of individual rights, of the benevolent functioning of an economic system based on private ownership of the means of production and the profit motive – of capitalism – calls for a radically new political agenda. It calls for a political agenda that progressively rolls back the interference of the state and progressively enlarges the freedom of the individual. This is now what political philosophy and economic theory at their highest levels of development recognize to be the essential means of solving social and economic problems. Movement in this direction – in the direction of individual freedom from government interference – is henceforth to be regarded as the standard of what is to be considered progress in the realm of political action.
It is on the basis of this newly resurgent, radically different political philosophy and economic theory – this philosophy and theory of individual rights and capitalism – that I explain the causes of the present crisis in medical care, criticize the Clinton plan, and present the appropriate solution and how to achieve it.
More... (http://www.24hgold.com/english/contributor.aspx?rss=true&article=2248871304G10020&redirect=true&contributor=George+Reisman)