American healthcare should be cheap and getting cheaper, easy to access, effective yet rapidly improving, and with nearly endless options for treatment, pricing, and method of delivery. The cheaper-faster-better dynamic we enjoy in high-tech areas that are not blighted by government regulation and control could and would apply to the medical and pharmaceutical industries if only we let it.
I disagree with this assumption. Healthcare is a labor-driven service, not a technology. The technologies in healthcare have exponentiated, but they require people to run them.
Also, as others have pointed out, healthcare is already being rationed in the US. Not between people near the top of waiting lists and those at the bottom, but between rich and poor. This is true of all private goods (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_goods), but the question is whether it's morally acceptable for something that has a direct impact on an individual's continued survival.
The Swiss healthcare model (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Switzerland) is interesting. It is basically a free market, with a compulsory "public option."
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I disagree with this assumption. Healthcare is a labor-driven service, not a technology. The technologies in healthcare have exponentiated, but they require people to run them.
Also, as others have pointed out, healthcare is already being rationed in the US. Not between people near the top of waiting lists and those at the bottom, but between rich and poor. This is true of all private goods (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_goods), but the question is whether it's morally acceptable for something that has a direct impact on an individual's continued survival.
The Swiss healthcare model (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Switzerland) is interesting. It is basically a free market, with a compulsory "public option."