My Letter to Ms. Harrop

...in response to this disheartening (pretense of) analysis: 

Ms Harrop,

Your conclusion represents a false choice between a supposed component of the current free market circumstance and a health care system more than 46% controlled by government.

"The only serious cost-cutting alternative to the free-market jungle is letting government put more order into American health care. Take your pick."

I realize your article is space limited but it left out such huge elements of the current cost drivers of the US health care system that it can't be taken seriously as analysis of the current reality.  I suggest to you Herzlinger's work, or Porter's, as bringing analysis that implicates government interventions which distort the value chain in US health care.  "Prices" for health care have become arbitrary, and are unregulated by market forces which we count on in every non-government enterprise to reward value and punish waste.  There is simply no reason to believe that any government enterprise - the military, transportation infrastructure, and our multiple systems of "welfare" - will ever be efficient or responsive to customer needs.  The experiment has been conducted, and it failed.  From Vallejo, CA (http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2011/10/11/california_ground_zero_for_budget_crises_265168.html), to Medicare's massive unfunded entitlement, the proof is there for those who have eyes to see it. 

As for the theoretical success of the Euro systems, Canada's cost issues are long standing and serious, and a Canadian dog has access to better medical equipment than a human does.  The dubious successes of single payer/socialized systems result from rationing of care, and that is reflected in the health statistics.  Saying that those in the US spend twice as much on health care completely misses the point - we can!  We have the money to spend because we have more liberty.  The rich always pay more new technology, and in that case the US spending on health reflects the same pattern. 

In short, the current system, although ostensibly 54% "market based", is riddled with well intentioned government interventions which have predictably negative unintended consequences.

You don't trust the government to spend enough via vouchers to support those in need, but the current system can't spend enough to do that either.  At least the voucher approach, and other concepts discussed by the aforementioned authors, can be paid for.  They also have the essential benefit of restoring some market based forces to the pricing system which would allow markets to reward value and punish waste. 

It is a stretch to say that your faith in government's coercive monopoly outcomes is less of a matter of religious faith than those who trust cooperative engagement between citizens, aka liberty.  The political calculus on display every single day in DC makes it clear for any who will pay attention that the system serves many interests, but not those about whom you say you are concerned. 

Even were one to make the enormous leap required to think that government has unfulfilled potential to help transform the circumstance of the poor in this nation, isn't it clear by now that theoretical potential will not be achieved? Sincerely, Paul Eich