Welcome, Comrade Patient
By Kim Bellard,
December 14, 2017
Capitalism is
in big trouble, even in the U.S. and especially among millennials.
So reports Fast
Company and The
New York Times. Even
capitalism-friendly publications like The
Wall Street Journaland Bloomberg warn about it.
The WSJ also showed a 2016
Gallop poll in which capitalism and socialism were rated equally
favorably (both just over 50%) by respondents ages 18 - 29, which was a
stark contrast to every other age group (support for capitalism goes up
by age, while support for socialism declines). Similarly, a 2017
WSJ/NBC News survey found that the 18-29 age group was much more likely
to say the government should do more to help people, again in contrast
to other age groups.
In some ways, the U.S. health care
system is a model of capitalism. Lots of people are making lots of
money, whether they be stockholders
in health companies, doctors and health
care executives, or even supposedly
non-profit parts of the
system.
Last year,
Senator Bernie Sanders made unexpected headway in his race to be the
Democratic candidate for President despite -- or perhaps because of --
his socialist leanings. One of his key planks was for Medicare for
all, an idea that has seen a strong resurgence generally. Even
more popular is the (admittedly vague) push for single payor.
We have some
hard thinking to do about how we finance health care, and for whom.
We have some hard thinking about what the role of profit, competition,
and capitalism should be in our health care system. We have some
hard thinking to do about why our health care system is not serving more
of us better.
This post is an abridged version of the posting in Kim
Bellard’s blogsite. Click
here to read the full posting |
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