‘The problem is that Obamacare promised too much: universal coverage, and no rationing, and lower costs.’
The moral case has never been sufficiently made to me that health care is a right. Of course, there were serious cost problems with the jerry-rigged system we had going (where our health-care delivery system was used to dispense care inefficiently to save lives), but the solution we’ve legislated will now require much more government oversight of a limited resource, potentially increased politicization of the issues at stake, and the likely growth of a vast bureaucracy with its own inefficiencies, self-interested politics and inertia. It’s as if we’ve backed into a forest of potentially unnecessary hazards without necessarily having the potential rewards to show for it.
That there is such a deep divide in our politics bears considering, and so too does the fact that Obama spent a lot of political capital to get this done, but fiscally (and the risks to freedoms we all hold dear with the deficit we have) I’m skeptical that this is a good outcome.
Related On This Site: A Few Health Care Links-03/18/2010 , From Youtube Via Althouse-’Paul Ryan: Hiding Spending Doesn’t Reduce Spending’…From If-Then Knots: Health Care Is Not A Right…But Then Neither Is Property?
The most knowledgable articles I’ve read that make the case for some government involvement are here:
Atul Gawande At The New Yorker: ‘The Cost Conundrum Persists’…
