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Sunday, August 30, 2009

Pricing = Rationing

Ezra Klein in the WaPo gets it half-right.
"Look at Canada," says Charles Krauthammer. "Look at Britain. They got hooked; now they ration. So will we."

So do we. This is not an arguable proposition. It is not a difference of opinion, or a conversation about semantics. We ration. We ration without discussion, remorse or concern. We ration health care the way we ration other goods: We make it too expensive for everyone to afford.
Bingo! Absolutely right. State-of-the-art health care is a luxury good. It's limited and right now you get what you can pay for, paying for it by someone, somewhere earning it. It's just like everything else we buy. By Ezra's logic, everything you pay for is rationed.

Clearly, this is just another illustration of why we need Yacht Reform now!

4 comments:

  1. KT,
    If only it were so. Rationing of Health Care is already a reality for Medicare recipients, military retirees and American Indians on reservations.
    Further, the current incentives in our tax code drive businesses to provide health insurance that looks like rationing to the average employee, even if technically it is not. But as John Mackey pointed out, there are free market alternatives.

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