Medical care could be cheaper for free!

I was talking to a guy whose Dad was a doctor in the F.D.R. Depression; he told me that his Dad used to take eggs and produce and a general "never-never" plan from anyone who couldn't pay. Back when most of us lived in small towns and most people had a sense of honor this worked pretty well.

Then came WWII and F.D.R. During WWII demand for skilled workers became so great that F.D.R put price controls on wages so companies couldn't compete for workers which would drive up costs. Clever employers found that they could offer pay "plus benefits" as a way to pay more without raising wages. F.D.R. liked this because he always intended to have government controlled medical care (along with everything else in his national-socialism scheme).

Soon it became standard that employers paid for medical insurance; then it became the law. The average workingman became divorced from the buying and selling of medical insurance and wasn't concerned with the cost, only the quality; doctors were no longer just dealing with the fellow citizens of their hometown, they were fighting the insurance companies for reimbursement.

The Average Joe went from having a family doctor to having medical insurance; when he needed medical attention he went to whoever his company had cut the best deal with. Because it was less common for a patient to have a personal relationship with his doctor it because quite normal to "sue his pants off" if anything went wrong. Any mistakes were unforgivable and beyond being "made whole" patients wanted punitive damages.

With the G.I. Bill millions of troops went to college; most of their parents had had eighth grade or at the most high school educations and many of them could have done the same jobs just as well if they had had a high school or a two year specialized degree, but instead the job market now demands a college degree for many positions that hardly demand it. (Not to mention the grades and degrees are being dumbed down as less qualified students are thrust into higher education.)

This trend continued to snowball through the Korean and Vietnam wars. In fact the low-interest loans that are subsidised by the taxpayers made it possible for even more kids to go on to college. Since the demand for college is always up, so too is the cost. It is ironic and unjust that the future-upper-middle-class have their tuition subsidized by their blue-collar peers who are already paying taxes. It is made worse by the fact that it is driving the cost of everything up.

By the same demand/price principal we can see that employer funded medical insurance caused the cost of drugs and medical technology skyrocketed far beyond normal. The profits were put back into research and development and more life-saving drugs and gizmo's became available at even higher prices.

If the average doctor wanted to provide medical care in his hometown the way his grandfather did he would not be able to pay his student loans, his medical malpractice (lawsuit) insurance, or for the drugs and hi-tech machines that are now the tools of the trade. A years worth of eggs, milk and tomatoes wouldn't do the trick.

It occurs to me that it would cost us nothing to cut off the lawyers gravy-train by capping punitive damages as they do in Texas and it would lower the costs associated with extra testing and procedures known as defensive medicine (defensive against lawsuits)

We could re-write the patent laws for future inventions (it is a matter of justice that this be phased in). I know it would discourage R&D, but who can afford to live this way anyway? To quote W. Bush "This sucker could go down." If they invent a new gizmo or drug we will all be obliged to buy it at whatever price they put on it, until the whole country is broke then that will be a worse evil.

We could allow for most care to be provided by nurse Practitioners with 4 and 6 year degrees instead of doctors with their 8 + years. There might be more mistakes and missed diagnosis, but I think most of us would make that trade-off. It would definitely meet our obligation to treat those who rely on public charity for treatment.

We could outlaw the advertisement of all prescription drugs to the general public; if you need it your doctor can prescribe it! We could mandate that they not sell drugs in other countries (like Canada)for less than they do here.If they want to give them away as charity then have at it!

We could mandate a nation-wide market for medical insurance with a certain level of "bare-bones" coverage with higher deductibles available linked to health savings accounts. We could set up health-care co-ops to lower prices and find alternative solutions.

We could encourage the return to midwives which are much cheaper and do a better job than a doctor anyway.

We could put salary caps on professors (especially the non-math and science guys who could never make that money in the real world) We could cap their pay by the hour; next cap the charge for tuition and cut off these schools public funds (they did alright for centuries on a lot less)

We could make all professionals dentists, doctors, lawyers and so forth post their rates on a state-run website that everyone could shop.

Finally, we could set up a state-by-state system in which every state is responsible for their uninsured and has the right to fine or garnish wages of anyone who doesn't have catastrophic coverage but has an income.