Does Barack Obama seriously think that there's a free market in medical care or insurance in Unites States? Is he ignorant? Is he trying to trick us?

Sure, there is a market, that is, people exchange goods and services. But it is by no means free from political mandates, controls, and prohibitions. That is what a “free market” is supposed to be free from, where people interact on a voluntary basis. Government’s taxing citizens to pay for other people's medical care, prohibitions and mandates on how insurance companies, hospitals, physicians, drug companies, etc. can interact with customers are all intrusions the market that make it less free.

As Ronald Bailey points out, "about 47 percent of all health care expenses today are paid for by federal, state, and local governments, e.g., Medicare, Medicaid, and State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP)." Both Medicaid and Medicare drive up insurance premiums, not to mention the taxes you pay for them.

And then there's regulation...

If you bound the arms and legs of gold-medal swimmer Michael Phelps, weighed him down with chains, threw him in a pool and he sank, you wouldn't call it a 'failure of swimming.'

So, when markets have been weighted down by inept and excessive regulation, why call this a 'failure of capitalism'?

One of the methods used by statists to destroy capitalism consists in establishing controls that tie a given industry hand and foot, making it unable to solve its problems, then declaring that freedom has failed and stronger controls are necessary.

Labels: Analysis

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