Milton Friedman on Socialized medicine

Comments

[Jim Splaine]

Ummmm, this guy is talking about something a third of a century ago, about different circumstances, and at a time when more people could afford health care. We're in a different century now when we have tough challenges throughout the world. In order to make sure we have a strong America -- and healthy Americans -- to compete with the rest of the world in the 21st Century, we need to have a healthy population.

Besides, Mr. Friedman had plenty of money to afford all the health care he wanted. The haves and the haves not should not be playing the Monolopy board game with health care, which is a right for all.

[Steve Mac Donald]

Jim, you have outlined for us the fundemental problem with progressive liberal thinking. It ignores the fixed nature of things that are inconvenient to its agenda. Economics is what it is. Socilaism is what it is. And how they interact is predictable regardless of any of the variables you suggest.

History, income, status, none of these has any relevance to those fundemental problems. That means they applied to buggywhips the same way they applied to 45 RPM records, the same way they apply to jet planes, PC's and even health care.

And Friedman was no elitest. Despite his success he strove to protect market forces that could guarantee attainable resources in every income group. Liberals on the other hand, do exactly the opposite. They misue government to skew resources making access more complex.