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
SHARE
Just when I thought economists couldn't have moved themselves to a planet farther from earth, one of them writes that because something has (probably) improved in sixty years, people shouldn't complain about its current price, and implies that this feature alone defines a functioning market. Cue passive-aggressive aside about health insurance, and this post is a perfect storm of unselfconscious irrelevance.
I bet a lot of working poor people would be willing to take the 1950s deal.
I think there are a whole lot of people, including me, who would take a deal like that if it was offered for 1990.
Some parts of health care are pretty much the same as they were in 1950 but lack of price competition has driven prices up. Changing sheets for example. Asprin for another. In metro Detroit, I hear adds on the radio for a price competitive test lab. If we had more out of pocket costs, there would be more of these.
Matt C: It's called medical tourism.
Joe: I agree completely but the cost of aspirin argument has always irked me. It's no different than people asking why a bottle of beer costs $6 in a bar next to Fenway Park while in South Boston you can buy a 6-pack for that price.
That being said, I think it would be really interesting to have a bunch of people from, say, Carnival Cruises, design a hospital from scratch, just to see what they might do differently.
On fiscal policy, my guess is that the Obama administration has concluded that they shouldn't do anything more. Their jobs proposal consists of a series of bills that are unlikely to add up to more than $100 billion. These are token bills to curry political favor, not serious proposals.
I need to dig it out, but when going through my parents things I came across the hospital bill from when I was born in 1948. It included five days in the hospital, anesthesia and baby care. If I remember correctly the total was $64.79. I know it was less than $70. I don't care how much healthcare has improved, this is a significant increase.
It is very difficult to compare. In the 1950s, I suspect that there were many cases of cancer that just went undiagnosed. Now, we can diagnose the cancer and in many cases, cure it. Today's healthcare may cost a lot, but I'll take it over 1950s healthcare.