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I'd argue that's in part because of the protection racket that's partially at the heart of the moral hazard: the poor regulation of healthcare services, at least in the US. What this should be laying bare is the failure of federal regulation, how this got in the way at a critical moment, and when it was too late, things only got better when they got out of the way. Or what about a healthcare system oriented toward protecting the hospitals, those at the top of a hierarchy, the rent seeking, and so forth, rather than oriented toward public health? What about an artificial reduction in the number of providers to increase their salaries, a lack of competition in provider models and delivery of services? There was a Slate article about how one side-effect of the pandemic is how much it has exposed bullshit everywhere, how easily so many rules are set aside when the cards are on the table. Some of this is happening now with healthcare, but few are asking what else could have been different, other than single payer care. To me this all feels like some kind of abuser-victim relationship, where people are subject to some broken system, and then when things go wrong and are failed, they're made to be dependent on their broken system and start cheering it on. I realize this all sounds bleak but to me there are so many things that could have been avoided, from the highest levels of the government all the way down, and there seems to be little introspection about this. Instead we just blame the virus, rather than what caused our systems to be so vulnerable in the first place. |
Note: I am NOT saying you are ignoring what I've said above. I have just seen many people make poor generalizations about government because of their experience with the American government's inability to prioritize citizens over the networth of the elite.