The Chicago Tribune posted an article today entitled Buffett: Health care a 'tapeworm' on U.S. economy. In this article Warren Buffet talks about how the cost of health care is eating away at the American economy. According to the article health care costs in the United States amount for 17% of our gross domestic product, while other countries only use about 9% percent of their gross domestic product towards health care costs. In the article Buffet wants health care costs to be reformed. He hopes that Congress will create a bill that reforms health care cost and not just the rest of the system, like they have done up to this point. The point that Buffet is trying to drive home is that health care costs are taking up too big of a portion of our GDP and the way to fix this problem is for Congress to create legislation that regulates how much health care companies can charge.
Milton Friedman would completely disagree with Buffet’s view of how health care cost should be decreased. Friedman believes that government should play an extremely limited role in the economy. He believes that they should be an umpire and that the government should handle the things that cannot be decided by proportional representation. In this case with health care costs Friedman would say that the reason that health care cost are so high to begin with is because there has been too much government intervention already. Friedman would argue that the health care companies and the market will choose the best price as long as the government does not interfere. According to Friedman the most that the government should do in this situation is to make sure that the health care companies are playing by the rules and if they are then leave them alone.
I disagree with Friedman’s view mostly because I don’t think that almost everything should be privatized, especially health care. I think that health care is something that everyone should have access to whether or not they can afford it. I also don’t believe that health care is necessarily something that should be making profit. That is why I think a government option would be a good idea. I also think that what Buffet is proposing is a good idea too. Health care companies should not be allowed to charge ridiculous premiums. There needs to be greater regulation or reforming of health care. Health care companies are basically betting on people’s lives and making a profit. I feel like people’s lives are not something that can be bet on and the way health care companies are making profits is outrageous. I also think that if Friedman had his way with the health care crisis we would all be in more trouble because the health care companies would have minimal regulation and would be able to charge more.
I wholly agree that health care should not be left up to the private market. As illustrated in our class discussion of national and public parks, I think our social consciousness prefers that some services in common, even if they could be more efficiently or profitably run through privatization. Thus, I think health care follows in the same vein: as a society we'd be more comfortable with government regulating health care rather than having the invisible hand of the market do it for us. I think this is only further amplified by, as you mentioned, health care companies in pursuit of profit.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you that health-care should not be something that is profitable. Why should companies be making money off of the fact that people need doctors and whatnot in order to stay healthy and to keep being able to live? I also believe that health-care should not be privatized. Afterall, businesses only run to maintain one goal: profit. And the sake of people's lives should not be something that one is able to make a profit out of.
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