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Comment by Aaronontheweb | Hacker News Reader

Massive government subsidies for health care consumption not only eliminate, but disincentivize price discovery. If your biggest consumers of health care (seniors) have access to the best health insurance plan in the world (Medicare), that's going to drive costs up

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Your whole argument is that the health care system should be optimized for the most productive members of society (like you, right now).

You are perfectly fine to have that belief, but the majority of people disagree with you, which is one of the primary reasons the system is designed as it is.

I think the market can do a better job of optimizing than central planning ever can - the problem is we have both the costs of capitalism and socialism concurrently with the model we have now. A worst of both worlds scenario.

A struggling business can go under.

When somebody is sick we generally save them even if the cost/benefit is poor. No market is going to solve this if you want to save sick people who don’t have a lot of money.

There is no place in the world where health care is solved, it’s one trade off vs another.

The US system is also far far from perfect but your solution is quite shallow and unlikely to fix things in a way society wants.

Have you ever looked into the way the market works for medical devices? And what happens if the implant or device you need to live is from a company that went bankrupt?

If you've ever spent even five minutes reading up on that stuff you would understand that health and medical cannot be a free market. It can never be a free market.

You know what actually drives costs up? The fact that healthcare doesn't work as a market. I can't shop for medical care. I don't have the knowledge and it's usually extremely time sensitive. This is a ridiculous statement that's only parroted by the most market-pilled right-wing economists.

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