Isn’t that how the argument normally goes? If you don’t want the government to provide health care for everyone, you must not care about people? Why don’t we take it a step further and name anyone a jerk that doesn’t want the government to ensure that every man, woman and child has food to eat, a house to live in and somewhere to work? Shouldn’t the government be in charge of making sure we all have everything we need? Well, I guess that depends on whether or not you believe that government should be able to take what it wants, when it wants, from whom it wants. We all know that the government doesn’t make any money of its own (ok, it prints money, but it can’t produce wealth), so how would it provide all these things? By taking wealth from its citizens of course. I don’t know about most people, but I always thought it was wrong to just take what you want from others against their will.
Besides, if we create government run health insurance, there is much evidence to suggest that it will make everyone in this country worse off. Despite what most people know about free markets, I think we all can agree that monopolies are bad and competition is good, right? If we allow the government to come into the market with a taxpayer subsidized insurance option, it will put most other companies out of business. That means less choices for us. Most people, except the rich who can afford better, will be stuck with a government insurance plan. Remember where government gets the money to pay for all of this. That’s right, the taxpayers. Is that an unlimited supply of money? Of course not. That means the government will only have so much to go around. What will they do to make sure they can give a little bit of care to everybody? They will limit what we can use the insurance for. How could they not? They do not have unlimited sums of money! It has already begun happening with the new US Government Task Force increasing the recommended age for mammogram screenings. Think that’s not the beginning of the government trying to save money? I would ask you to think again. And if you truly believe the task force is right in its recommendations, I’d like to know if your feelings would change had it been Bush in the White House.
Where a private company has to make a profit to stay in business, the government doesn’t. Does that prove that business owners are just jerks trying to make a profit? No. It shows that a private business has to ask for your money, the government just takes it. In order for the private sector to get people to voluntarily give up their income, they have to offer something people want in return. They have to give good service, offer good products and do a good job (so long as they have competition), or they risk going out of business. The government can just take money from the taxpayers when it needs to, so there is no incentive to offer the best service or the best price or the best product. Why should they? It’s not as though the Post Office will go out of business if it loses money. As a government agency that enjoys no competition, it is able to “borrow” from the taxpayers to get necessary funds. The bottom line is this: when companies must compete with each other and have to rely on profit to stay in business, they have no choice but to give consumers what they want. Government relies on their guns and prisons to get what they want from people. If you don’t want to pay them, you go to jail. Simple as that. If you don’t want to buy from a private business, you don’t have to. If you need a product or service in the free market, you have many choices to choose from instead of one.
We need more free market choice in our health insurance options. The government has done a great job of stifling competition, which has created the high prices we see today. We must stop that from happening if we truly want better and more affordable health insurance. Free choice, lower prices and better options? Now that is where the heart is.
