Goolsbee's Take on Sicko

Moderate views regarding the appropriate policy approaches to fixing health care messes in the US are a bit rare at this time. More often what this blogger encounters are vituperative statements that are not only lacking in subtlety but heavily-laden with smear words such as "greedy health insurers" on the one side and "socialized medicine" on the other. Taking a more incisive view, it is not difficult to see why blatant mis-characterizations abound. It is because the market for health care is particularly difficult to design well and protect against market failure. Dispassionate analysis has almost entirely disappeared in the shouting matches that have been generated by Michale Moore's movie, Sicko.

Austan Goolsbee, writing in the Slate Magazine here, runs through the facts of the problem on financing health care in the United States. Pointing out some of the glaring facts that the movie fails to acknowledge, he however concludes that the diagnosis of the problem is right while the policy prescription is not as well-informed.

Essentially, the well-argued piece sums up what this blogger has alluded to in earlier blog posts. First, the existing model for financing health care leaves many US citizens without any cover while placing a disproportionate burden on employers. Secondly, the insurance companies have an understandable incentive to keep the really ill from treatment because they pose higher risks. Thirdly, the possibility of a single-payer or universal health plan funded by government will not be the silver bullet because the demand for medical care will far exceed the supply.