18.8.05 [ The CMA is a bunch of no-good Swindlers ] 0 comments 
Let's clear some things up. Firstly, there seems to be a strong emotional attachement by most people to the word "monopoly". For many, it conjures the image of a bunch of overweight men in three-piece suits, smoking Romeo Y Juliettas around a dark oak table, counting stacks of cash, laughing smugly amongst themselves at the expense of the working people. For me, a graduate of economics, the word conjures graphs and charts and various other abstract representations of an element of the market system. When CMA spokespersons use the word in the same sentence as "health care", it is the former image to which they refer. It is a fear tactic.
Friends, it is not the government who sits around the table counting dollars at your expense. The government has a monopoly on only one thing: taxes. With respect to health care, there is another cartel who holds the upper hand in negotiation, a cartel of professionals who are unsatisfied with 4 000 square foot houses and five-car garages, a group of people for which membership is entirely exclusive and elite, a collusively bound organization who will benefit markedly and immediately from the privatized of health care. Yes, friends, that cartel is the CMA itself.
My dad, a government bureaucrat who manages the finance of federal ventures, takes the bus to work because gas is too expensive. All the members of the CMA, and I know since they were all at my golf course last week to celebrate their convention, drive their own cars (no carpooling, massive "hemi" SUVs for everyone).
Some of their conversations were overheard while I was serving their 12oz Rib Eye steaks.
"What we really need, Jerry, is to incorporate a business education into medical training."
"Certainly, Sarah. Some of us don't even know to hire accountants."
What's going on here is this: the medical professionals are preparing themselves to operate as businesspeople first and medical practitioners second. Why? Because that's the sort of thing that the profit motive encourages.
The CMA charges that the government is responsible for decreased medical service standards through a monopoly on health insurance. In reality, it is the doctors themselves who control every aspect of treatment--including wait times. The government is merely an insurance provider.
Under a monopoly pricing paradigm, public insurance would be unaffordable to high-risk individuals, thus not everyone would be covered. But, since the government has a mandate to provide coverage to everyone, the premium to be insured is far below even the competitive equilibrium price. This is possible through cross-subsidization (since the government has general revenues, taxes, to draw upon).
The CMA's true concern is not monopoly at all, it is monopsony. There is a single purchaser of their services, the government. This means that they have little bargaining power with respect to the price of their services. With multiple insurance providers, there would be competition among purchasers of medical services, but a cartel of providers. Under a privatized regime, there would be a shift in the balance of power and medical services would become more expensive and less proliferate. Indeed, wait times would be longer under the private system--I will not offer the mathematical proof here as any first-year student is familiar with the monopoly solution.
Friends, I must emplore that we be weary of the claims of the CMA. Their interests are not our interests. Yes, take their advice with respect to your health (well, so long as they have no incentive to have you visit more frequently, as is the case under the public system), but when it comes to matters of economics, acknowledge that they are rational players in the public arena; they seek to maximize their own welfare first.
Friends, it is not the government who sits around the table counting dollars at your expense. The government has a monopoly on only one thing: taxes. With respect to health care, there is another cartel who holds the upper hand in negotiation, a cartel of professionals who are unsatisfied with 4 000 square foot houses and five-car garages, a group of people for which membership is entirely exclusive and elite, a collusively bound organization who will benefit markedly and immediately from the privatized of health care. Yes, friends, that cartel is the CMA itself.
My dad, a government bureaucrat who manages the finance of federal ventures, takes the bus to work because gas is too expensive. All the members of the CMA, and I know since they were all at my golf course last week to celebrate their convention, drive their own cars (no carpooling, massive "hemi" SUVs for everyone).
Some of their conversations were overheard while I was serving their 12oz Rib Eye steaks.
"What we really need, Jerry, is to incorporate a business education into medical training."
"Certainly, Sarah. Some of us don't even know to hire accountants."
What's going on here is this: the medical professionals are preparing themselves to operate as businesspeople first and medical practitioners second. Why? Because that's the sort of thing that the profit motive encourages.
The CMA charges that the government is responsible for decreased medical service standards through a monopoly on health insurance. In reality, it is the doctors themselves who control every aspect of treatment--including wait times. The government is merely an insurance provider.
Under a monopoly pricing paradigm, public insurance would be unaffordable to high-risk individuals, thus not everyone would be covered. But, since the government has a mandate to provide coverage to everyone, the premium to be insured is far below even the competitive equilibrium price. This is possible through cross-subsidization (since the government has general revenues, taxes, to draw upon).
The CMA's true concern is not monopoly at all, it is monopsony. There is a single purchaser of their services, the government. This means that they have little bargaining power with respect to the price of their services. With multiple insurance providers, there would be competition among purchasers of medical services, but a cartel of providers. Under a privatized regime, there would be a shift in the balance of power and medical services would become more expensive and less proliferate. Indeed, wait times would be longer under the private system--I will not offer the mathematical proof here as any first-year student is familiar with the monopoly solution.
Friends, I must emplore that we be weary of the claims of the CMA. Their interests are not our interests. Yes, take their advice with respect to your health (well, so long as they have no incentive to have you visit more frequently, as is the case under the public system), but when it comes to matters of economics, acknowledge that they are rational players in the public arena; they seek to maximize their own welfare first.
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