A wiff of truth about Single Payer and Medicare

Discussion in 'Economics' started by truehawk, Sep 27, 2009.

  1. mhparker

    mhparker

    Wow! Re-reading Trading In The Zone this morning, I am fascinated by Douglas’s theory about how our brains become conditioned to resist structure, discipline and responsibility. His point in a nutshell is that we’re all born with natural curiosity about everything, and of necessity, our parents have to squelch this curiosity repeatedly. This creates deeply ingrained emotional dissonance – any current necessity to structure or regulate our lives (any perceived loss of freedom) causes an instinctive reaction somewhere on the emotional spectrum between slight resistance and extreme anger or fear. I'm wondering if this also might explain why in every debate about healthcare reform, the people arguing from the right seem much more emotional than the folks on the left. Any thought of “more government” taps in to the same kinds of emotions that get in the way of good trading. Being willing to be governed (whether by trading rules or elected officials) feels similar to being willing to have your curiosity squelched by your parents. Now I understand.
     
    #31     Sep 29, 2009

  2. Thank you mhparker for your hypothesis on resistance to government, structure, organizing principles, etc.

    It is all so clear to me now. :)
     
    #32     Sep 29, 2009
  3. piezoe

    piezoe

    If in the first sentence of your post you were to replace the words "can only afford to" with the words "would rather not" the remainder of your post would make more sense, at least to me. With average physician income before benefits after 3 years of practice ranging from $250,000 to $830,000 per year, depending on specialty, it is a little hard to swallow the idea that physicians will go broke if they treat too many medicare patients at today's quite generous reimbursement rates. You can't be serious!

    The real reason why medical care in the U.S. costs twice as much as it does in the next most expensive country and far, far more than in most highly developed countries is made clear, I hope, by my parody above of the way American Medicine operates.
     
    #33     Sep 29, 2009