Socialism at work.
The NHS was parasitic on centuries of British work ethic and civic spirit.
That’s gone. Socialism destroyed it. Socialism consumes and destroys cultural capital.
It would happen a lot faster here, since we are a nation of hustlers, and not orderly and public-spirited, deferential and humane, like the British were when they started down this road in 1945.
People respond to incentives. Public property is nobody’s property.
The response to this will be a cry for more funding. More money down the rat hole.
And all the supposedly smart people want the USA to go this way. No way. We should be going in the exact opposite direction.
The two most stagnant sectors of our economy are ones the state is most heavily involved in: health care and education. If both were turned into vigorous, capitalistic, competitive, consumer-responsive industries, something we are good at, America would dominate the world in a generation.
(Hat tip: Instapundit)
The United States exports education and health care, providing the top products in the world in both fields.
Of course, both fields are marked by a lack of market forces, especially in the creation of its best products in either field.
Anyone who thinks competitive marketing forged either health care or education in the U.S. just flunked history, and please keep them out of my ISO 9000 program, too.
People respond to incentives. Public property is nobody’s property.
Clearly, you’re a dirty capitalist pig and with thinking like that we’ll be in the midst of a revolution and living in caves in no time. What we need is a smart Nomenklatura that will guide us every step of the way like the one we had in all highly successful communist countries. They were so successful, we should follow their example. Ah, the logic of the left.
The United States exports education and health care, providing the top products in the world in both fields.
a.) Only higher education and only because it is not run by the government. Primary and secondary schools, run by the government, are a disaster.
b.) The U.S. has better health care only because healthcare here is as socialized as it is everywhere else. If it were, it would suck as much as European healthcare (or, as Lexington points out, probably even more).
Anyone who thinks competitive marketing forged either health care or education in the U.S. just flunked history
Any one who thinks higher education and health care are marked by a lack of market forces just flunked real world, and please keep them out of our voting booths.
Our primary and secondary education is pretty well socialized and it shows. But our higher education system is open and highly competitive, from admissions to graduation to research. Likewise, health car is highly competitive as the salaries earned by cardiologists and orthopods indicate. Both industries are facing demands from the market for transparency which will only increase competitiveness. When Americans start paying to be treated by Canadian physicians, the superiority of socialized medicine will have been demonstrated.
I hope Higher Education is as good as some people say it is.
When I watch lectures on the internet that feature conservative speakers, the crowd looks like its ready to rush the stage and devour him.. usually.
The Q8A sessions are embarrasing.
I saw a film called Indoctrinate U about the rampant arrogance of the Left and its control of campuses.
What’s going on is so shameful.
I’m so proud of america and its history..I feel it’s a betrayal of everything the way these Leftists are acting and miseducating.
hio hum–more simplicity. 51 years ago at a Catholic hospital in Hew Haven Ct I was around when exterminators had to be rushed in to destroy a huge army of cockroaches. Today, we see staph infections responsible for a lot of deaths in private hospitals.
Can you name any American university that does not get a lot of federal money?
Our public schools are state-run, but not federally run…would you make all education at every level private? Ok. But then simply say so.
More Americans are now going overseas for treatment than every before. A very few wealthy Canadians come here.
But the main point: not one candidate running for national office and talking about health care change has stated that he or she wants a Federal program that is like the system in England. They have suggested federal insurance, the sort of thing–yes: that the banks are jump[ing for: federally insured accounts.
I have no problem whatsoever with a free and competitive market place economy. But that means NO subsidies for the industries the way they are now subsidized by our money and still making very nice profits. A “free market” should not be subsidized by my taxes.
Can you name any American university that does not get a lot of federal money?
Speaking of oversimplifications, define “a lot”.
would you make all education at every level private? Ok. But then simply say so.
Publicly funded and privately run.
More Americans are now going overseas for treatment than every before. A very few wealthy Canadians come here.
What percentage of those Americans are going abroad for healthcare are going for plastic surgery? Where’s your data?
They have suggested federal insurance, the sort of thing–yes: that the banks are jump[ing for: federally insured accounts.
Both are a bad idea. If you think that either is a good idea, you haven’t been paying attention to medicaid and the current “credit crisis”. Also, I don’t expect much out of either candidate, since politics is all about promising to pick the pocket of “A” on behalf of “B” and neither candidate is as economically literate as an Econ 101 student after his first week of classes. Sad.
I have no problem whatsoever with a free and competitive market place economy. But that means NO subsidies for the industries the way they are now subsidized by our money and still making very nice profits. A “free market” should not be subsidized by my taxes.
I cannot begin to express just how much I agree with you on this.
I simply can’t resist.
51 years ago at a Catholic hospital in Hew Haven Ct I was around when exterminators had to be rushed in to destroy a huge army of cockroaches.
How’d they miss you?