The Faux Ryan Plan Controversy
Contrary to what you may read in the media competing claims by liberals and conservatives are not mutually exclusive. Democrats continue to push the idea that the Ryan plan will change Medicare as we know it. Sure it will cause Medicare as we know it is without a doubt unsustainable. It would be a crime not to change it.
Republicans have argued it will allow us to preserve Medicare. Sure it will. Spending less on an out of control program will certainly preserve the program for longer than it could exist otherwise.
Medical Care is a service we all use at some point in time and a lack of care can have the catastrophic and irreversible result of death. This creates a moral hazard that cripples our ability to deal rationally with the issue. I certainly want my care when it comes down to it so it creates an ethical dilemma for me to deny your care. This societal quid quo pro agreement has sent medical costs spiraling out of control as we try to give everyone all the care they want.
First imagine medicare as a mansion with all the perks with a mortgage you can't even get credit to afford. The Ryan Plan simply says we need to move into a smaller house with a mortgage we can afford. This prospect has many outraged but there is simply no way to afford the mansion anymore. Common sense dictates that you must find a way to live within your means which is never a happy thing to learn when you have been living above your means.
To further the analogy the Ryan Plan chooses a house that is rather modest lacking the bells and whistles bought with obscene amounts of debt. For all practical purposes few would argue that it was a gross injustice for a family to live in a home they could afford but due to the mortality associated with health care we get stuck in this moral dilemma. Rather than giving up a pool or extra bedroom you are giving up potentially life saving care.
Reality still dictates that we cannot have all the care we want. We can stay in the mansion until foreclosure and move into a nice cardboard box or we can accept reality and lower our expectations. Now some folks will still be able to pay for costly and extravagant procedures but just because some can still afford the perks doesn't mean there is a gross injustice being perpetuated. Some eat steak while others eat hamburger. Its isn't feasible for everyone to have steak and impractical to make everyone eat hamburger.
Medical innovation has made many formidable illnesses and forms of malaise cheap and easy to treat while at the same time creating many new expensive treatments for things previously untreatable. A large driver of costs has been these new costly innovations for dire medical conditions. Procedures out of reach for this generation will be common place in the future and there will be newer costlier innovations developed as long as we do not bury ourselves in debt for the sake of the here and now.
Mindless dedication to medical expenditures today lead to less prosperity and innovation in the future. Faux outrage and moralizing for the sick and uninsured of today is a price paid by those in the future.
We should receive the care we can afford and are willing to pay for, no less, no more. Turning a blind-eye to the unsustainable nature of Medicare is nothing short of selfishness and greed. It may ease your sensibilities to imagine that life is priceless but we can't afford to keep paying this bill.
Tyson Bam
May 27th, 2011
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