The Sickness

The most tragic sins a country commits are those that involve failures of both one's self-interest and one's love for his fellow children of God. In other words, things that are both stupid and selfish. Some things are just stupid, and some things are just selfish, but when they combine....

With the issue of health care, the self-interest or economic component and the moral component point in the same direction. A tax-funded mandatory health plan for all Americans would give everybody health care and lower the cost per person. Period. Yet and still, it is not done.

Right now, the United States pays by far more per person for health care than any other nation. So, we must have the best quality care, right? No, we have 1/6 of our people uninsured and our nation ranks 38th in the world in terms of quality of care. We rank behind Morocco.

So we pay the highest bill in the world to give 5/6 of our people the 38th best health care on Earth. Stupid? Clearly. Selfish? Yes.

So our first conclusion must be that the system needs radical change, unless we think the above numbers are acceptable, which hardly comports with a chest-thumping or even a humble iteration of pride in this country.

Let's think about car insurance. All drivers (essentially every adult in the nation) are required by law to buy insurance. Whenever any American citizen is inside an automobile, he or she is in a vehicle insured against accidents. Should our very bodies not enjoy the same luxury? You'll fix my oil pump but not my broken leg?

Personally, I have problems with a government mandate to purchase anything from a for-profit company, but that caveat aside, let's consider what this requirement results in.

The result of every driver being insured can be interpreted in two ways. The first way, which is both stupid and selfish, is to say, "why should I, a great driver, be paying for all these idiots who are crashing into each other?" This is a very valid point, and should be recognized as such. But it it also very short sighted.

Taking this approach is akin to urging President Obama to somehow intervene in Iran; it might make us feel righteous, but it accomplishes nothing in the short term and guarantees instability in the long term.

The other way to interpret the auto-insurance mandate is to say, "an insurance pool this large creates an economy of scale which makes the product cheaper for everyone. And even if I never crash into anyone, I know that all my fellow citizens have the security of insurance so that if one of them crashes into ME, I won't be screwed."

And maybe, just maybe, I take pride and joy in the fact that my fellow citizens are protected.

So, what if we applied this logic to health care? We apply it to "defense". Rhode Island has never been invaded by North Korea, but Rhode Islanders pay their part to arm and defend South Korea so as to deter North Korea. Quite a stretch. But we do it.

We apply this logic to schools. I have no children, but I pay my share to fund my neighborhood schools. We apply this logic to fire departments. My house has never caught on fire. Yet and still, I pay my share.

So why don't we apply this logic to health care? Because it will cost too much, we are told. As noted above, we already pay per person more than any other country. So, there's that. Also, aren't some thing worth a trillion dollars?

The Iraq War has cost a trilli so far. In microeconomics, "opportunity cost" represents the loss of the next best thing. So, if I spend 30 minutes blogging, the opportunity cost of that would be the 30 minutes that I could have spent riding my bike or doing something else.

So what if we hadn't invaded Iraq? What would have been the "next best thing"? What was the opportunity cost? Health care for every American?

I'm no communist. I harbor more revulsion for Lenin, Stalin, and Mao than bin Laden and Darth Vader combined times twenty. But I am something of a National Socialist, or a Nazi, if you want to be technical.

The premise of National Socialism was that one's community was important enough to override economic dogma and adopt socialism under certain specific conditions. And before Hitler morphed into the devil, he used this ideology to provide quite a bit for his nation.

I think my nation deserves socialism in certain specific islands. If we adopt National Socialism when we want to pay to kill Iraqis, what does it say about our nation if we refuse to do the same in the interest of curing Americans? Selfish. And Stupid.