Dirk, I think the first point that I really have to clear up is about what we free market healthcare people want: we want the same thing you want, which an affordable, and efficient healthcare system for the people. We are not only thinking about profits here, you need to realize that, so the moral argument really doesn't suffice here because we both want what is best for the people. The left seems to forget this a lot and blames the right for only caring about the rich, which is not true.
When the chips are down, you'll find that it's profit the capitalist businesses want, not to help people. And there is more potential for giving up dosh among the bourgeoisie.
Second, the private sector is made up of the people and businesses. Everyone who is not in government is part of the private sector- it is not just the corporations. The laws of economics clearly show that consumers have a large effect on things such as market price, especially when there is a lot of market competition. What we free market healthcare people want is more competition, which would be created by reducing regulations and taxes on the healthcare market. The United States' current healthcare market is one of the, if not the most regulated markets in this nation and it is far from free. Government favors certain parts of the markets and this is what creates problems such as those with the insurance companies. If the government were to just leave them alone, the consumers would have more power in their hands, there would be more competition, and prices would be lower.
This is partially true. But the free market is economic theory. It simply cannot work without intervention from the Government, which is why it is flawed. Prices would likely be higher, as there would be no checks against monopolies and oligopolies.
What you advocate is to put businesses into direct control. You presume that they will be controlled by the market. But what stops them from attempting to manipulate the market? I advocate putting the people in direct control.
Now on to your specific points. You say that private hospitals may hire less than public hospitals, but what is wrong with that? They should only hire what is necessary and considering that public hospitals would mean tremendous market distortions and deadweight losses in other markets, the market with private hospitals would almost certainly have more jobs available than the market with public hospitals.
What is wrong with it? Fewer people being employed, means a decrement of individual fiscal security for those that would otherwise be employed.
On to the vitally placed hospitals- again this is all going to be a measure of demand. If there are a lot of sick patients in an area and no hospital near by, then of course a private company would go there because they could make money and at the same time these patients would get a closer hospital. Making money should not be demonized because it often produces other socially beneficial outcomes with it. Now look at this circumstance from a government perspective, especially in times like these. With deficits like never seen before many states and local governments are currently being forced to cut spending and there is very little chance they would build new hospitals right now because they can't afford it. The private sector, on the other hand, is composed of millions of people and there is a much higher chance that someone with capital will build a hospital even in tough times because they know the profit oppurtunity is there.
There is a lot less profit opportunity in a poor community that cannot afford vast healthcare costs, for an American example, out in the Deep South somewhere.
A private institution may be run for profit, but that doesn't mean it isn't efficient. Looking at history, private institutions have always been more efficient and tended better to the consumer than the government. Look at the government and the businesses it runs such as the DMV and look at the horrible service it has there opposed to private businesses.
It is not that it isn't efficient. A lot of the time, it is. But your current system has a considerable private beauracracy, as you say, which makes it not cost efficient. However, with a transparent system, that is run by the people, for the people, as opposed to by the Government (supposedly) "for the people", or businesses - for themselves, there is a lot less potential for corruption.
You say standards can not be effected by the consumer, but that is very wrong. Consumers are part of the private sector and in free markets they have more direct power because there is more competition and they can simply leave an institution they are not happy with or boycott it instead of going through the middleman government and the [FONT="] bureaucracy that comes with it. The private sector is a lot more tentative to the people's needs and it is a lot more efficient at meeting them when they are really needed.
I did not suggest that they cannot be affected, i said that the consumer has a reduced power over it. I do not deny that the consumer in the market has power of a business, as does, to a lesser extent, a potential consumer. However, nationalised healthcare would mean that it is run for the people and would, therefore, in theory, be more responsive to demands. In my system, to put the people in direct democratic control (actually of all public services) of healthcare means that this power would be greatly enhanced, and there would be a considerable increment of accountability to the people.
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No one is saying anything against the right to life. As I explained earlier, you think the government would provide it in the best way, we think the free market would.
You're half-right, half-wrong. You seem to have my intentions confused. I agree that we have (possibly equal, who knows) different views of how a healthcare system should be run. However, i do not think that thew Government should run it, but that the people should run it. The worker's soviet in charge of this service is democratically run by the people and is independent from the Government. Apart from funding. But this is a set up that makes it easy to put services under full control (in all ways) to the people, when the state is no longer required. That is one of my reasons. The other is that it is more ethical to give the people direct control over their own healthcare, on a very local level.
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Competition and a free market system would be able to bring prices low enough that most people would be able to afford it. If taxes and such were further reduced, there would also be an increase in philanthropy and the private sector would be able to take care of those that still can't afford it. Anyway, government run healthcare often comes with longer wait times and lower quality of healthcare, which leads to worse treatment and more patient deaths than a free market system.
Can you give me proof behind this claim? Considering the deadweight losses, the regulations, the bureaucracy costs, and production losses, it can't be lower than a free market system. You need to look at the big picture of what such plans do.
Okay, as an example of these systems, i'm going to use the UK's healthcare system. For the nationalised, pre-1979. For the capitalist (not wuite free market, i'm afraid), the 1980s, when healthcare was run as a business.
Longer wait times - true. However, my system works on a local level. This increases efficiency considerably (in theory, of course).
Lower quality of healthcare - false. The capitalist-run system had far inferior services. To be more cost-efficient, and thus maximise profits, hospitals only had minimal stocks of emergency equipment, and minimal emergency staff, which meant a lot of people who went into A&E, didn't come out without a toe-tag. I have a humanitarian view. I want a system where more people will live. I see that system as a different one to the one you see.
As for the quotation from the Commonwealth Fund and the doctor, again we don't like the current system. Why do you think we have those intermediaries? Not because the free market chooses to have them (look at any real free market and you never see such private bureaucracy,) but because government policy favors these institutions.
This is true, i digress on that part. Keep in mind that there will be little power to control a beauracracy either way if it is run without intervention. This is a major flaw of capitalism as a whole. As you may guess, i do not think the Government should be very powerful.
In conclusion, you seem to have a view that somehow, a system that runs on the basis of greed will somehow create a balance (unlikely, in realistic terms), and also that it will work, almost on a secondary level, for the good of mankind (also questionable). Also, you presume that without Government intervention, the system will somehow work better with no controls over monopolies, no controls over oligopolies, no controls over the formation of cartels. You appear to be of the belief that this will somehow
increase efficiency quality of service, whether we are talking of healthcare or anything else. In taking the system of free-market capitalism as your ideal, you take all of its flaws, also, whether in economic form, or otherwise.
