So in your world, there would be a separate business for each dichotomous choice out there. So I'd need to go to the non-smoking, sanitary, fire-marshal approved, treat-employees-well businesses. Four things: you'd need sixteen different stores to service all the options. I know, you claim that the marketplace would weed those other places out, but people are willing to sell out almost anything for a widget that's 3¢ cheaper. (See: Wal-Mart.) And the ramifications of an unsanitary building that's likely to burn down while playing their employees shit extends well beyond the people who choose to do business there. Contagious disease, spread of fire to adjacent buildings or farm- or woodland, economic stagnation.


Imagine the totally feasible scenario of someone losing their job due to, let's say, bankruptcy of their employer, who loses their health insurance. Before he can find a new job, he falls seriously ill. At this point, no insurer will touch him. He has done nothing irresponsible, yet is in the lurch. He can't pay to get better without a job, and he can't get a job until he gets better.

Right now, that problem is solved by the government requiring that healthcare providers provide health care without questioning the patient's ability to pay. That ignores medications, though, which would likely be unaffordable to that person.

So in your no-government-regulation scenario, what happens? He dies?


So what happens when the parents fail to take care of their kids? No irresponsible people in your utopia? Or does the government regulate what they're required to do? What about when that unlucky bastard above dies? The kids die, too? I guess they were just unlucky, too.


In your world, I guess, they just go naked.


Bull. Shit.

Here's the scenario: Patient: "I'm dying of cancer, but your medicine will help me. Give me some." Pharma: "Okay, that will be $100,000, please." Patient: "But that's all the money I have in the world." Pharma: "Too bad. Buy the medicine or die."


And you think that's going to come about from deregulation? A company's sole goal is to make money. It will do everything in its power to maximize profits. This almost inevitably means pricing out a good 20% of the market.


People walk down the street with untreated diseases every day. They cannot afford their medications. Hell, my family pays several hundred dollars each month for medication that is covered by a pharmaceutical plan. That's just copays. I'm fortunate to have a well-paying job, but not everyone is so fortunate.

Yeah, people seldom die from simple trauma in the US, but that's because of government regulation requiring hospitals to treat them regardless of the likelihood of getting paid. People declare bankruptcy all the time due to medical bills. In your world, more people would die from broken bones because the hospital would have no reason to treat someone who isn't going to pay them.


Due to the exorbitant cost of healthcare in this country and the contingent lowering of general health, people are not able to contribute to society because they're spending all of their resources on being sick all the time.

Which brings me to another point. The world you're describing is not society. It is small ragtag groups all out for themselves. There's no common good that is the hallmark of society. You're describing some sort of plutocratic neo-feudalism.

The thing that strikes me the most about your arguments is that almost every one has a "aren't allowed to do that" or "won't do that" element to them. But the only way you be assured that that is the case is by regulating those things.


Your view of the world is bleak, my friend.

It is a priority for me that everybody has the right to the best healthcare possible, and I am willing to pay for it. No one likes to pay taxes, but they are what make societies possible.