Healthcare isn't a business, it's peoples lives

[vlad321]

mrstickball said:

vlad321 said:

Viper1 said:

That's a rather dubious proposition though.  You can't base a health care system on something like that.

 

Well what I'm saying is to let the government pay the researchers and doctors to discover the cure. Maybe slightly inefficient (maybe if people in government were assigned by merit not favor done to the guy above) but it would still be better off for everyone than if a business did it. I'd rather pay the government than some person in a business, at least I control who I'm paying for a week every 4 years, not so with a business.

At least the politicians have a little more incentive than jsut money, they need to get re-elected, so they serve the people at least to a larger amount of a degree than a pure businessman.

 

Wrong. You elect businessmen with your dollars every day. You elect politicians once every 4 years in the US, but the lifespan of a businessman is far worse if they perform badly. How many CEOs get fired a year versus politicans? I'd argue that the CEO has to do far more to be viable than the politician. Not only this, many Americans vote for politicians not based on results, but rather promises. Politics is far more promise-driven than results-driven.

Because of that, capitalism-based programs can, and always will be better when money is involved. Businesses seek to be more efficient than the next one, because there's something called 'competition'.

And that's what truly makes capitalism based solutions better: Competition. With public healthcare, pension, and schools, there is absolutely, positively, no competition for something 'better' - it just exists. With no real competition in a given field, the quality suffers. Go look at the US education system. When it was private-based, it was much better in quality. But when federal funding took it over in the name of fairness, we've now plunged ourselves in a bad mess - more problems, less solutions, because those that are in power really don't have the abilities, nor drive, to create true solutions.

Attack all you want, but the United States, despite being this 'hyper-capitalist' state that some deride, still is one of the most prosperous nations in the world, and did it with much bigger obstacles than what Europe has faced.

 

 

No, just... No. The ONLY reason the US is "prospering" is because of the fact that every other country was anihilated thoroughly in the 2 world wars. No one else had any industry or any development. No one had anythign elft. In fact it's kind of pathetic that a nation which got levelled by the Germans and took 20 million in casualties, was able to "compete" with a nation which was thoroughly unafected. Not a single factory was destroyed, no civilians died, no homeland attacks (Pearl Harbor was a millitary base and tha was it). So no, US's prosperity is based on the fact that no one else had anything, and that all the rich and smart people feld to the US. Thinkig otherwise is pure ignorance.

 

As to your elected thing. Take my AIDS cure as an example. You aren't electing naything. Those people can raise the price as high as they wish. It would be the political equivalent of a Dictatorship. No thank you. I'd rather have the government take it. The job of every business is to do better than the competitors, and if opssible, drive them out of business. Yes prices may lower, but as soon as there is no alternative they more than make up for it.