Health Care

The Disaster of Government-Run Businesses, Part 1

by Jim Powell March 1, 2010

Part 1 | Part 2 Barack Obama defied experience everywhere when he stubbornly claimed he could make a government-run health program work. The standard practice of any government-run business is to provide favored interest groups with something for nothing, forcing other people to pay for it, and there always seem to be complications. If Obama really wanted to see how ...

The Road to Health-Care Serfdom

by Sheldon Richman February 5, 2010

I sensed a bit of frustration during President Obama’s state of the union address when he said, “The longer it was debated, the more skeptical people became.” I’m not totally sure what point he thought he was making. After all, it wouldn’t speak well for a proposal if prolonged discussion of its particulars created doubt about ...

The Political Economy of Health Care

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 2010

Trouble begins the moment health care becomes a matter of government spending. From then on, unless the policy is reversed, society is on the road to state intervention in peoples most personal decisions. Its easy to see why. If government starts picking up the tab for some peoples medical services, those people will not face the full costs of those ...

Not So Strange Health-Care Bedfellows

by Sheldon Richman January 6, 2010

One thing can be said in behalf of the health-insurance overhaul currently shaping up in Washington: it has revealed the curious bedfellows that politics creates. Congress almost certainly will pass a bill that compels every American to have medical insurance. If his employer doesn’t offer it, he’ll have to buy it himself or be fined. This justifiably offends everyone who ...

There’s No Such Thing as a Free Mammogram

by Sheldon Richman December 10, 2009

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) holds the distinction of being the first senator to offer a successful amendment to the big Senate health-care overhaul bill now being debated in Washington, D.C. It is a perfect lesson in what’s wrong with the political mentality. According to Mikulski’s news release, the amendment would “guarantee women access to preventive health care screenings and care ...

Kill the Insurance Mandate

by Sheldon Richman December 4, 2009

If Congress manages to pass a health-insurance bill in the next few weeks, it will undoubtedly require every person to have medical coverage or pay a fine. If someone’s employer doesn’t offer a policy, he will be obligated to buy one for himself no matter how expensive. (Subsidies will be available to lower- and middle-income people.) Coverage is not likely ...

Health-Care “Reform”: It’s All About Power

by Sheldon Richman November 13, 2009

If the politicians who are bent on redesigning the medical and medical-insurance industries really wanted only to curb rising prices and help the uninsured get coverage, they would have zeroed in on the previous government interventions that created those problems. Instead, they are pushing grand schemes to turn our medical decision-making over to bureaucrats. That indicates that the so-called ...

Nationalized Health Care and Economic Fallacy

by Sheldon Richman November 1, 2009

It takes a discussion of the role of government in health care to really bring out the economic illiteracy among the politicians and commentariat. The long list of fallacies they have uttered about markets and government is truly stunning. Take competition. President Obama, after several unsuccessful attempts at selling his plan to redesign 15 percent of the U.S. economy, turned ...

Obama’s Tax on the Middle Class

by Sheldon Richman October 12, 2009

President Obama has no intention of keeping his campaign promise not to raise taxes on the middle class. Hiding this will take some clever moves, but maybe, now that he has won the Nobel Peace Prize, he’s trying for an Olympic gold medal in mental gymnastics. The tax increase for the middle class will come ...

A Modest Health-Care Proposal

by Sheldon Richman September 16, 2009

Enough dithering! President Obama says it’s time to act on health care. I agree. But act how? Are we really going to be happy with the pussy-footing proposals floating around Congress? All the so-called reformers want to do is tinker with insurance regulations. But how effective would that be, considering that the insurance companies themselves support the changes? We have taken ...

Health-Care “Reformers” Duck the Hard Questions

by Sheldon Richman September 4, 2009

Advocates of what is called health-care “reform” must lack confidence in their case. Were they sure that more government control of medicine and medical insurance was a good thing, they would answer the opposing arguments rather than marginalize their adversaries as corrupt or crazy. In debating a controversial issue, a good-faith participant rebuts the strongest possible opposing arguments. He doesn’t ...

Welcome to Post Office Health Care

by Sheldon Richman September 1, 2009

America’s health-care system has problems — all traceable to government intervention — but it could be worse. And if the so-called reform emerging in Congress is enacted, it will be worse. The nub of the plan is that everyone must have health insurance and that all but the smallest employers should provide it. If someone doesn’t have coverage, he’ll be ...