Is "Free medical for all" a good idea? I will explore that point in this blog.
I feel that free medical for all is a good, but there are more aspects that need to be considered. Like all decisions, this one is a choice between alternatives. Each alternative has to take into account its affects on other things. In mechanics we use the "free body diagram" to make sure we have taken into account all the affects of an action.
It is clear that the money needed to fund "medical for all" has to come from some place. To make my point, I am going to use some numbers. We now have about 300 million people and about 150 million get their medical coverage as part of their employment. About 50% of the others, or 75 million get their medical paid for by taxpayers. That leaves about 25 million who can afford to pay for their own medical requirements. That leaves no more than 50 million who have "no" medical coverage. With me on these numbers?
We know from our government's experience with Veterans Hospitals that when the government takes over something, it costs at least 50% more. If we examine the numbers above, it is clear that the total cost for "medical for all" will cost significantly more if the government takes it over. We now spend almost 20% of our GNP on medical. This is by far the most of any country in the world. If we are now going to spend more, where is the money going to come from and what other things will we have to give up? You know that there is no free lunch here.
What we should be doing is trying to figure out how to spend "less" on of our GNP on medical! We could look at other countries who spend less and have similar life expectancies, but most don't want to do that. How about making this personal? Would you recommend that one of your children become a doctor? Do you have any idea how much it would cost here in the USA? Is your kid smart enough to get into medical school? Why is it that we graduate less than 50% of the doctors needed? It appears to me that we are shooting ourselves in the foot when it comes to medical doctors.
If we want medical cost to go down so that more can afford them, we have to figure out how to get doctors to earn "less" and for it to be faster and cheaper to train a doctor. Do you see anyone talking about that? How about our legal system that "leaches" so much money from our medical system? No country in the world has a perverted legal system like we have! Did you know that? We have more lawyers than doctors while in many countries around the world, it is just the opposite.
Rather than suggesting that government take over our medical system, why don't we focus on way to make our medical system more efficient? We all know that more government is not the solution!
I feel that free medical for all is a good, but there are more aspects that need to be considered. Like all decisions, this one is a choice between alternatives. Each alternative has to take into account its affects on other things. In mechanics we use the "free body diagram" to make sure we have taken into account all the affects of an action.
It is clear that the money needed to fund "medical for all" has to come from some place. To make my point, I am going to use some numbers. We now have about 300 million people and about 150 million get their medical coverage as part of their employment. About 50% of the others, or 75 million get their medical paid for by taxpayers. That leaves about 25 million who can afford to pay for their own medical requirements. That leaves no more than 50 million who have "no" medical coverage. With me on these numbers?
We know from our government's experience with Veterans Hospitals that when the government takes over something, it costs at least 50% more. If we examine the numbers above, it is clear that the total cost for "medical for all" will cost significantly more if the government takes it over. We now spend almost 20% of our GNP on medical. This is by far the most of any country in the world. If we are now going to spend more, where is the money going to come from and what other things will we have to give up? You know that there is no free lunch here.
What we should be doing is trying to figure out how to spend "less" on of our GNP on medical! We could look at other countries who spend less and have similar life expectancies, but most don't want to do that. How about making this personal? Would you recommend that one of your children become a doctor? Do you have any idea how much it would cost here in the USA? Is your kid smart enough to get into medical school? Why is it that we graduate less than 50% of the doctors needed? It appears to me that we are shooting ourselves in the foot when it comes to medical doctors.
If we want medical cost to go down so that more can afford them, we have to figure out how to get doctors to earn "less" and for it to be faster and cheaper to train a doctor. Do you see anyone talking about that? How about our legal system that "leaches" so much money from our medical system? No country in the world has a perverted legal system like we have! Did you know that? We have more lawyers than doctors while in many countries around the world, it is just the opposite.
Rather than suggesting that government take over our medical system, why don't we focus on way to make our medical system more efficient? We all know that more government is not the solution!
