5 ms·

Incentives! That is 100% the only right answer to healthcare problems in our country.

croon 9y ago
Care to elaborate? Analogy: How do you get people to win the game? "Reward the winner". Sure, but what's the game, how do you win it, what's the reward, how do you distribute it.
- Consultant32452 9y ago
  The best case scenario is that each person is empowered to answer those questions themselves. The worst case scenario is to have someone else define for you what winning is and how you should go about doing it.
  - croon 9y ago
    That's somehow even more vague than GP. I think the issue is pretty clear: The US has too expensive healthcare, and too low quality in relation to that price. The solution "incentives" isn't really constructive in solving that issue, if you don't suggest what those incentives are. And as for your comment: within this problem space, everyone defining their own healthcare system and solving it is even less constructive.
    - Consultant32452 9y ago
      The point is that the "healthcare system" should be an emergent one where each person is maximally in control of their own destiny. The idea that a few wealthy, connected, buyable people could get to "define the healthcare system" is terrifying.
      - croon 9y ago
        I think you're describing a separate problem, of campaign financing, lobbying and/or corruption. > The point is that the "healthcare system" should be an emergent one where each person is maximally in control of their own destiny. Again, this is a nice sounding platitude. What does it mean? Since you want everyone to be "maximally in control", does that mean Mad Max-style anarchy? Representative democracy ensuring everyone gets a voice and securing of rights? Both ensures freedoms, but in very different directions.
        Consultant32452 9y ago
        Mad Max isn't anarchy, it's a centralized authoritarian dictatorship. What you're talking about where you want me to suggest a definition of "the game," how it's played, how to win, etc. is closer to Mad Max. With regards to healthcare, the best system is one in which each individual person has autonomy over themselves. Each will have its own desires: making money, saving money, receiving treatment, etc. The "system" emerges from the accumulation of human desires and abilities. I can't tell you exactly what it looks like because I can't pretend to know what everyone will want, nor can I tell you what is best for everyone. They are best left to determine that themselves.
        croon 9y ago
        Mad Max was anarcho-capitalism reaching its logical conclusion, a monopoly with a financed militia. > With regards to healthcare, the best system is one in which each individual person has autonomy over themselves. Each will have its own desires: making money, saving money, receiving treatment, etc. The "system" emerges from the accumulation of human desires and abilities. I can't tell you exactly what it looks like because I can't pretend to know what everyone will want, nor can I tell you what is best for everyone. They are best left to determine that themselves. So basically no health care system and no social security, and bartering for whatever you want. Just say you want libertarian minimal government and we'd have saved 10 minutes of our lives instead of vague platitudes.
        Consultant32452 9y ago
        >Mad Max was anarcho-capitalism reaching its logical conclusion, a monopoly with a financed militia. Authoritarianism comes in many stripes. Capitalism can be authoritarian, but forced socialism always is. >So basically no health care system and no social security, and bartering for whatever you want. Emergent systems exist all over the place. The very language we're using right now to communicate is an emergent system. There is not a central authority which dictates how we must converse, and yet here we are. >Just say you want libertarian minimal government and we'd have saved 10 minutes of our lives instead of vague platitudes. I didn't try to give you a platitude. You wanted me to define what is best for everyone and I tried to show you that your question implies that authoritarianism is best. I disagree with your implication.
- skookumchuck 9y ago
  Have a free market in health care. (The U.S. health care market is anything but a free market.)
  - positr0n 9y ago
    What do you mean by that? I'm sympathetic to making healthcare look more like a free market, but I don't know what a free market in health care looks like. If you don't have money, society shouldn't just let you die. The second you try to fix that (with government) you don't have a free market.
    - skookumchuck 9y ago
      The US had a free market in health care before the 1960s. Health care was a lot cheaper then, and charity was available for poor people.
      - DoveBrown 9y ago
        And health care was a lot worse in the 1960s and before. Let's not pretend that before the 1960s were some golden age. In 1965 infant mortality was 24.7 deaths per live births, in 2016 it was 4.3. Sources: 1965 number from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_20/sr20_020acc.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_20/sr20_020acc.pdf 2016 number from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_and_under-five_mortality_rates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_an...
        skookumchuck 9y ago
        They've been trending downward in the US since 1800. https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1960/compendia/hist_stats_colonial-1957/hist_stats_colonial-1957-chB.pdf https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1960/compendia/... You can see by the other stats in the PDF that all measures of health improved dramatically 1800-1960.

Care to elaborate? Analogy: How do you get people to win the game? "Reward the winner". Sure, but what's the game, how do you win it, what's the reward, how do you distribute it.

Consultant32452 9y ago
The best case scenario is that each person is empowered to answer those questions themselves. The worst case scenario is to have someone else define for you what winning is and how you should go about doing it.
- croon 9y ago
  That's somehow even more vague than GP. I think the issue is pretty clear: The US has too expensive healthcare, and too low quality in relation to that price. The solution "incentives" isn't really constructive in solving that issue, if you don't suggest what those incentives are. And as for your comment: within this problem space, everyone defining their own healthcare system and solving it is even less constructive.
  - Consultant32452 9y ago
    The point is that the "healthcare system" should be an emergent one where each person is maximally in control of their own destiny. The idea that a few wealthy, connected, buyable people could get to "define the healthcare system" is terrifying.
    - croon 9y ago
      I think you're describing a separate problem, of campaign financing, lobbying and/or corruption. > The point is that the "healthcare system" should be an emergent one where each person is maximally in control of their own destiny. Again, this is a nice sounding platitude. What does it mean? Since you want everyone to be "maximally in control", does that mean Mad Max-style anarchy? Representative democracy ensuring everyone gets a voice and securing of rights? Both ensures freedoms, but in very different directions.
      - Consultant32452 9y ago
        Mad Max isn't anarchy, it's a centralized authoritarian dictatorship. What you're talking about where you want me to suggest a definition of "the game," how it's played, how to win, etc. is closer to Mad Max. With regards to healthcare, the best system is one in which each individual person has autonomy over themselves. Each will have its own desires: making money, saving money, receiving treatment, etc. The "system" emerges from the accumulation of human desires and abilities. I can't tell you exactly what it looks like because I can't pretend to know what everyone will want, nor can I tell you what is best for everyone. They are best left to determine that themselves.
        croon 9y ago
        Mad Max was anarcho-capitalism reaching its logical conclusion, a monopoly with a financed militia. > With regards to healthcare, the best system is one in which each individual person has autonomy over themselves. Each will have its own desires: making money, saving money, receiving treatment, etc. The "system" emerges from the accumulation of human desires and abilities. I can't tell you exactly what it looks like because I can't pretend to know what everyone will want, nor can I tell you what is best for everyone. They are best left to determine that themselves. So basically no health care system and no social security, and bartering for whatever you want. Just say you want libertarian minimal government and we'd have saved 10 minutes of our lives instead of vague platitudes.
        Consultant32452 9y ago
        >Mad Max was anarcho-capitalism reaching its logical conclusion, a monopoly with a financed militia. Authoritarianism comes in many stripes. Capitalism can be authoritarian, but forced socialism always is. >So basically no health care system and no social security, and bartering for whatever you want. Emergent systems exist all over the place. The very language we're using right now to communicate is an emergent system. There is not a central authority which dictates how we must converse, and yet here we are. >Just say you want libertarian minimal government and we'd have saved 10 minutes of our lives instead of vague platitudes. I didn't try to give you a platitude. You wanted me to define what is best for everyone and I tried to show you that your question implies that authoritarianism is best. I disagree with your implication.
skookumchuck 9y ago
Have a free market in health care. (The U.S. health care market is anything but a free market.)
- positr0n 9y ago
  What do you mean by that? I'm sympathetic to making healthcare look more like a free market, but I don't know what a free market in health care looks like. If you don't have money, society shouldn't just let you die. The second you try to fix that (with government) you don't have a free market.
  - skookumchuck 9y ago
    The US had a free market in health care before the 1960s. Health care was a lot cheaper then, and charity was available for poor people.
    - DoveBrown 9y ago
      And health care was a lot worse in the 1960s and before. Let's not pretend that before the 1960s were some golden age. In 1965 infant mortality was 24.7 deaths per live births, in 2016 it was 4.3. Sources: 1965 number from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_20/sr20_020acc.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_20/sr20_020acc.pdf 2016 number from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_and_under-five_mortality_rates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_an...
      - skookumchuck 9y ago
        They've been trending downward in the US since 1800. https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1960/compendia/hist_stats_colonial-1957/hist_stats_colonial-1957-chB.pdf https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/1960/compendia/... You can see by the other stats in the PDF that all measures of health improved dramatically 1800-1960.