ARNOLD KLING
August 14, 2011
The Top Political Contributors
August 11, 2011
Gender and the New Commanding Heights
August 11, 2011
Jamie Galbraith Makes an Assumption
August 11, 2011
Macroeconometrics: The Science of Hubris
August 10, 2011
Real and Nominal Bond Yields
BRYAN CAPLAN
August 14, 2011
The Effect of Thumb Sucking on Income
August 12, 2011
The Voice of Cold, Hard Truth to All Would-Be Educators
August 12, 2011
Ability, Morality, and Prosperity: A Paper and a Report
August 11, 2011
The Theory of Time and Frittering
August 10, 2011
Male Variance and the Remnants of the Gender Gap
DAVID HENDERSON
August 9, 2011
Hayek in "Unbroken", Part Two
August 8, 2011
Hayek in "Unbroken"
August 5, 2011
James Bovard on the Peace Corps
August 4, 2011
Summers Way Off on FDR and 1941
August 3, 2011
The "Amazon" Tax
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And/or some people lack insurance because it's very expensive, but refuse to forego risky behavior.
David Hemenway made the same argument. QJE 1990. He called it "Propitious Selection": the more risk averse are more likely to buy insurance. His empirical evidence is more "here's a bunch of studies that are consistent with my hypothesis", but the basics seem to be all there. Not sure why it wasn't cited in the Cutler et al piece.
I live and work in MA, and refused to take the insurance my company offered. It would have cost me $2500 on the year. (I'm not sure of my legal status. I'm currently uninsured, but I don't know if that's allowed in this state anymore.)
What I find most interesting is the response people have to the choice I made. They think I'm crazy. I admit I'm taking a risk. But come on! Relax!
Rue Des Quatre Vents what I find funny about peaple's reations ("They think I'm crazy") is that most hospitals will give you terms. It is therefore often a questiom of paying more now or less later.
One tenet? proposition? principle? of libertarianism is "You should be free to do what you want as long as it does not interfere with my freedom to do what I want."
When I apply that to health insurance, the way I look at it is: were my brother in law to decide to forgo insurnace, and then get a serious illness, I would be (for all practical purposes) obligated to help him in what ever way I could.
That is going to likely involve money. If he goes into tremendous debt fighting the illness and survives, I'll certainly be called upon to help him put his financial life together in some way - help pay rent, cosign a loan for a car or property, etc.
So, the way I see it, when people choose to go without life insurnace, they are making a choice that is placing an obligation on me. Granted, it is a social obligation rather than a legal one, but I choose to live in the real world where in many ways social obligations are compelling.
So, I think some simple form of universal coverage isn't indefensible from a libertarian point of view.
Chuck: I disagree wholeheartedly. Just because something is good and/or salutary (you helping your uninsured brother, or your brother insuring himself) does not mean it should be mandated. You could make precisely the same argument for forcing people into buying unemployment insurance and preventing them from investing in risky endeavors.
I think it is highly corrosive to one's moral character to create a legal obligation on someone else which is intended to prevent them from forcing one's self into fulfilling a moral obligation.
When democrats speak of adverse selection don't they mean by the insurers. I always thought that they meant that you cannot get insurance if you are not healthy.