Universal Health Care - Page 5

Kaj · #41 08-07-2007, 07:06 PM

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but your argument was that because one accepts A) (military by government) they must accept B (health care by government) so why not force them into C (everything by government).

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No, that wasn't my argument. My argument was that if one accepts govt intervention as morally acceptable for A, then it is morally acceptable for B. You may still argue against govt health care for other reasons, but you would be logically inconsistent to argue against it on moral grounds*.

* By moral, I mean arguing against govt intervention on the basis that such govt power is an illegitimate use of force.

Dr. Strangelove · #42 08-07-2007, 07:13 PM

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It appears we have little more to discuss on the subject.

I will add that I agree completely that the people who want government out of healthcare but in the roads, schools, courts, police, etc. have no intellectual leg to stand on. Once you concede that you think a coercive monopoly can provide any good or service better than a competitive free market, trying to confine the socialist djini to certain sectors of the economy but not others is intellectually bankrupt.

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If by "any" you mean "every" I think very few people actually hold such a view. If by "any" you mean "a single" then I don't see how intellectual bankruptcy follows.

It seems reasonable to suspect that government might be able to administer some particular industry better than private business due to differences of structure and incentive. If such an industry exists it hardly seems intellectually bankrupt to advocate governmental administration of said industry while opposing governmental administration of industries for which private enterprise are better suited.

GoodCallYouWin · #43 08-07-2007, 07:14 PM

"It seems reasonable to suspect that government might be able to administer some particular industry better than private business due to differences of structure and incentive."

It may seem reasonable... but can you give us an example?

Kaj · #44 08-07-2007, 07:22 PM

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It appears we have little more to discuss on the subject.

I will add that I agree completely that the people who want government out of healthcare but in the roads, schools, courts, police, etc. have no intellectual leg to stand on. Once you concede that you think a coercive monopoly can provide any good or service better than a competitive free market, trying to confine the socialist djini to certain sectors of the economy but not others is intellectually bankrupt.

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If by "any" you mean "every" I think very few people actually hold such a view. If by "any" you mean "a single" then I don't see how intellectual bankruptcy follows.

It seems reasonable to suspect that government might be able to administer some particular industry better than private business due to differences of structure and incentive. If such an industry exists it hardly seems intellectually bankrupt to advocate governmental administration of said industry while opposing governmental administration of industries for which private enterprise are better suited.

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I think if you replace Boro's "can provide" with "is morally justified in using force to provide" (and eliminate any comparison to a free market, which I believe is a tangent), then I think it all clears up.

Kaj · #45 08-07-2007, 07:26 PM

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"It seems reasonable to suspect that government might be able to administer some particular industry better than private business due to differences of structure and incentive."

It may seem reasonable... but can you give us an example?

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Depends on how you define "better", and that is purely a subjective measure based on personal values. I can say that UK's universal health care is better than the US system (even if free market) if I define "better" as % covered. Of course, many if not most would not consider this the only measure of merit. But measures of merit are ultimately subjective -- there is no absolute moral standard to compare them.

GoodCallYouWin · #46 08-07-2007, 07:30 PM

"But measures of merit are ultimately subjective -- there is no absolute moral standard to compare them. "

This is, if you'll excuse me, pure sophistry. There is no question in my mind that the free market provides better health care than socialism.

Borodog · #47 08-07-2007, 07:33 PM

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It appears we have little more to discuss on the subject.

I will add that I agree completely that the people who want government out of healthcare but in the roads, schools, courts, police, etc. have no intellectual leg to stand on. Once you concede that you think a coercive monopoly can provide any good or service better than a competitive free market, trying to confine the socialist djini to certain sectors of the economy but not others is intellectually bankrupt.

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If by "any" you mean "every" I think very few people actually hold such a view. If by "any" you mean "a single" then I don't see how intellectual bankruptcy follows.

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Because whatever faulty logic led you to concede that a coercive monopoly could supply one particular good or service better than a competitive free market can always be slipped around your neck and used to hang you on any other.

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It seems reasonable to suspect that government might be able to administer some particular industry better than private business due to differences of structure and incentive.

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What does this even mean? There is no possible way to say that the quantity of a good or service produced on the market is not optimal, since there is no objective way of defining this optimality other than the market itself. You can't look around the market and decide that in you opinion there aren't enough barbers, and hence advocate a government monopoly nationalize the barber industry to produce more. Or at least if you do, then this same line of thinkinf works equally well for any other good or service that some others might subjectively decide the market is not producing enough of, hence requiring the nationalization of that industry.

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If such an industry exists it hardly seems intellectually bankrupt to advocate governmental administration of said industry while opposing governmental administration of industries for which private enterprise are better suited.

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Again, there are no such industries for which a coercive monopoly can supply goods and services better than a competitive free market

Competitive markets by their vary nature allow many solutions to be tested, with better solutions being selected for in terms of profits accruing to those entrepreneurs who better provide for the wishes of the consumers relative to their competitors. Poorer solutions are selected against, with the worst solutions, the wasteful ones, being rapidly terminated by the losses born by those entrepreneurs. Thus, over time the capital stock and the structure of production is continually fitted to the needs and desires of the consuming public, regardless of the nature of the goods or services in question.

Contrast this with a coercive monopoly, which unilaterally, coercively imposes a single monolithic set of goods or services on the consumers within the industry, in the absence of any market feedback by the consumers themselves. The government can suffer no economic losses, for it can simply make up its losses at the point of the revenuer's gun or at the printing press. Government solutions to economic problems then become institutionalized, entrenched and bureaucratized.

The latter system cannot out-perform the former system, all else being equal, regardless of the industry, good or service in question.

Kaj · #48 08-07-2007, 07:33 PM

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"But measures of merit are ultimately subjective -- there is no absolute moral standard to compare them. "

This is, if you'll excuse me, pure sophistry. There is no question in my mind that the free market provides better health care than socialism.

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And that's why debating with you is rather fruitless. It takes someone with more intellectual capacity and openness to discuss complex topics in a thoughtful manner.

But just for fun... can you please provide me the "absolute moral standard" by which such human activity should be judged? Since after all, it must be obvious to all.

Dr. Strangelove · #49 08-07-2007, 07:35 PM

Not that I need to provide an example for my point to hold, but I suspect the government could provide universal blackjack to the masses while maintaining better odds and similar (conceivably lower) overhead than private business.

It might even be able to avoid a dreaded stagnation in blackjack innovation.

Borodog · #50 08-07-2007, 07:36 PM

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"It seems reasonable to suspect that government might be able to administer some particular industry better than private business due to differences of structure and incentive."

It may seem reasonable... but can you give us an example?

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Depends on how you define "better", and that is purely a subjective measure based on personal values. I can say that UK's universal health care is better than the US system (even if free market) if I define "better" as % covered. Of course, many if not most would not consider this the only measure of merit. But measures of merit are ultimately subjective -- there is no absolute moral standard to compare them.

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Be my guest. I choose to normatively, subjectively define "economically better" as "providing a higher standard of living for more people."

"Economically best" I choose to normatively, subjectively define to mean "providing the highest possible standard of living for the largest number of people", and by my definition the free market is easily the best. And it isn't even close.