Zack Morris wrote:That doesn't sound like a free market solution. The market approach is simplest: those who have money, live, those who do not, die.
nice emotional appeal that misses the reality of most westerners not being in the extremes of poverty nor being hyper rich and dropping top dollar on cutting edge cures.
what we really have here is the mess of conflicting ideology around choices and responsibilities and the fact america is probably doing the worst case blend of all that.
the vast magority of westerners can throw the 10-30 dollars a week or whatever it is for private healthcare and they can afford to eat healthy and exercise, if they actually did prioritise lifespan and elderly health.
the simple fact is most dont choose that and then we have all sorts of systems paid for buy taxes to try and fix that.. from health department budgets for advertising to sin taxes on fatty,salty foods or alcohol and the FDA controlling who is allowed to sell what foods to who, all the way to the end game of hospital treatment.
the right wing argument is that if you stopped taking all that money for things that apparently arent working anyway then atleast the people who do prioritise health issues would have more money for doing so.
we have an expectation for puritan health nut outcomes and a frustration with the fact most people would rather get wasted and eat junkfood going on here..
im in the latter category for most of my life, im under no illusions about how much the guvmint can save me from myself.
maybe your arguing for a more authoritarian regime to force us to prioritise health choices.