Just What The Doctor Ordered

In this age of great innovations, companies like Apple have wowed its clientele with its Smartphone and Samsung has left consumers ogling over the Galaxy phone amongst other wonders. Corporations like Amazon have grown exponentially by providing the kinds of goods and services that we want with the highest quality, but with a competitive price. Private industry has produced technological wonders which have improved the quality of life for consumers, meaning the public everywhere, by responding to what markets, meaning the public, wants. It is amazing to wander past an Apple store (pre-Covid) and see lines just to get inside the building. Once inside, customers are shoulder to shoulder, vying for the attention of sales personnel, wide eyed and chatting enthusiastically about the latest gadgets and apps. The dynamism of markets is apparent! The quality of life for the average American has grown significantly because of the quality of goods and services supplied by the private sector. There is no disputing this! Then, when we have our conversation about health insurance, it is truly befuddling to read that support for a public option for health care is growing. Why? In this 21st century age of entrepreneurship, why do we accept a 1930s solution to healthcare! Meaning more government! I have never understood this? We talk about innovative private companies responding to markets and then there is the government. What is the government and its bureaucracy responsive to? Growing budgets and pork barrel spending are a few items which come to mind. How does this make the public healthier and richer? Can’t seem to think of anything? Of course, proponents of the public option derail big bad insurance companies making a profit. Those profits are a terrible outcome!? Of course, there is rarely any criticism of companies like Amazon with a healthy bottom line delivering the items we want at a competitive price with high quality making a profit. What is the difference between a private company and the government? It is competition and the ability to make money! Should I say it again? Yes! It is competition and the ability to make money. You need to give organizations an incentive to deliver goods and services to the market. This includes health care. You give bright, innovative entrepreneurs an opportunity to create health care products that individuals need with lessened government regulations and chances are the price will go down because competition has increased. Just look at the market for Lasik eye surgery. Less government regulation allows for market forces to go to work and you have improved quality at a lower price. How does the opposite work? The Affordable Care Act or otherwise known as the dreaded Obamacare. Promises such as health care costs would be reduced $2500, and you could keep your doctor bantered around, but in the end when you have increased government regulations and decreased competition-the result, not surprising-higher prices and poorer quality. Am I able to keep my doctor? Probably not. Do I pay more? Of course! Where is the competition to drive prices down? Nowhere to be found. What is the solution? Free markets! Detractors will again deride this unfettered capitalism. Is there a place for the government? Yes. Regulations are needed to control the excesses of the market. No one is denying that individuals or companies will not fall off the rails and pursue approaches which undermine the workings of the market. But what the public must realize is that the government can also fall off the rails and pursue policies which undermines the public good. Hmmm. Obamacare! The power of the government is exponentially greater than any single enterprise in America. This fact seems to be lost on the public. That is why the power of the government needs to be limited, and we need to allow the entrepreneurs to devise, to craft, to produce the goods and services that are desired by the public which includes-yes healthcare.