Why Public Healthcare Doesn't Work
For many years, people have been debating whether or not Healthcare is a human right and if it should be controlled and governed by the government. However, I find that there are a lot more advantages to the economy and the people, if a country's healthcare is completely privatized.
The United States, which is an (almost) capitalist country, about 80% of the people are covered by private healthcare. However, there still are people who are below the poverty line, who still can not afford healthcare. Well, for those people, there is a tax system for people who earn below the poverty line and it's called the Negative Income Tax system, which I will explain later this article.
Whenever someone tells me that a National Healthcare System would solve the health care issue I ask them if any of the other government programs have completely solved any of the other issues. Examples are the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Housing program, the Federal Welfare program or even the Federal Urban Renewal Program. Almost none of these programs have achieved their goals, and that is because government does not work better than people do in a free market society. People can take their own decisions.
Another issue of centralized healthcare is how fair/equal is it for everyone? Someone who works in a coal-mine, smokes cigarettes, eats hot-dogs and drinks Mountain Dew all day, has a higher chance of getting very sick because he's living unhealthy, whereas a man who works in a clean environment and watches out for himself, probably won't get anything worse than a common cold. Why should the healthy man pay the same amount of tax dollars for healthcare as the man who is living unhealthy. The healthy man shouldn't be obligated to pay for the unhealthy man's healthcare through tax dollars. This applies for things like motorcycle riders and people who don't wear their seatbelts. People in motorcycles have a higher chance of getting in an accident and requiring healthcare, but why should other people pay for their healthcare through their tax dollars? They shouldn't, because it is simply not fair. In a free market economy, each person takes their own risks and pays for them, whereas in a social centralized economy, everyone pays for one persons mistake. Same goes for seat belts. A person should not have to pay a ridiculously expensive $300 fine for not wearing a seat belt, because he isn't potentially hurting anyone other than himself. It's not as if he is going to crash launch himself out of his car onto another poor person who is minding his own business. The person in the car, will probably get extremely hurt, but he will pay for it through his own private healthcare, whereas in a centralized healthcare system, all the tax payers will have to pay for it. This means that in the long term, the government spending will increase dramatically and taxes will increase. We can see this from recent statistics and research on ObamaCare which will increase the national deficit by over $900 billion during its first 10 years and over $1.9 trillion over the next two decades (CBO).
My final point is on the Negative Income Taxing System, which is a system developed by Juliet Rhys-Williams during the 40's. It is where people earning below a certain amount receive supplemental pay from the government instead of paying taxes to the government (Wikipedia). Here is a link of Milton Friedman clearly explaining how efficient the Flat and Negative Income Tax would be. http://youtu.be/xtpgkX588nM
To conclude, a free market healthcare system is a much more efficient, affordable and fair for all people, because it will provide any type of health care the people would want or need at a price they feel is right for them, and this can only happen if subsidies such as the AMA and other government sectors that I've discussed are abolished. Health care should be private for the same reason property ownership, car ownership decisions, and food choices should remain private. The person with the greatest interest in the decision is the person who is most affected by it. Freedom is tied to personal responsibility. Give a people "free" (tax paid) services of any kind and most will misuse it because they aren't responsible. They aren't paying. This is why a socialist democracy has never lasted and this is why personal responsibility is the best way to preserve and maintain a free society.
