So I’m engaged in another little office cleanup project, getting a deal on a new APC Back-UPS surge protector/battery backup in return for recycling the old one, and when I haul the previous edition to the UPS Store to ship it off, the manager is tending to an elderly gent who is having some class of episode.
He’s sprawled out in an office chair, not particularly responsive, and has lost control of his bladder. The manager is taking his pulse and talking quietly to him, one hand with a damp cloth on the back of his neck, as her assistant speaks with 911. We can hear the sirens, and as the fire truck and an ambulance pull up outside, he mumbles that he doesn’t want any ambulance ride because it will cost him $50. The small shop fills up quickly with firefighters, paramedics and their gear.
Eighty-eight years old, fades out in a UPS store and can’t afford a $50 ambulance ride. Sports a POW-MIA cap. A son, maybe? Who knows? I conduct my little bit of business and roll out the door.
On the way home I hit the radio and Terry Gross is chatting with doctor, bioethicist and author Robert Martensen about the U.S. health-care system. They agree it has a couple of hitches in its gitalong. No fucking shit. Y’think?
I come home to a voice mail from our accountant. Seems we owe Uncle Sugar a couple thou’ to keep Wall Street from taking an infarction. Thank God the money isn’t going for any of that socialized medicine this new crowd in Washington, D.C., is on about. I’d sure hate to see The State tinker with a private enterprise that’s ticking along so smoothly.
Mad Blog Media 
Check out the Frontline episode from 3/31–“Sick Around America.”
That’s when it hits home, Patrick.
Sarcasm…in print….I love it!
The idea that the incentives of the private sector (basically greed) are somehow more efficient than those of government (getting reelected) is about the lamest argument I’ve ever heard, and one that will not die. Different incentives, sure. Sometimes competing incentives, maybe. But one better than the other?
Seems like a nation whose government was based on checks and balances would embrace the idea of checks and balances. Let the private sector have their shot at it, then Big Brother steps in to tweak it when it runs amok. And the private sector has screwed not only the pooch but the house cat, the hampster, and any other critters it has found laying about.
The funny thing about the “don’t touch our well-greased machine” crowd is that they base their argument on one important fact: that the US leads the way in cutting edge medical innovation. Well, now, why is that? Maybe because Uncle Sugar has dumped tons into universities with medical research departments? Because Uncle Sugar provides medical coverage for its millions of employees, forcing the private sector to keep pace?
So, the free market works… as long as the taxpayers are priming the pump. But let’s not turn around and actually do something for said taxpayers.
SteveO:
Perfect. I’ve never read a better explanation of free-markets vs. government regulation.
I think the ultimate end result of a truly free market is a type of mafia/feudalism. I think that’s what we saw with the investment banks. Of course the other end of the spectrum is Big Brother. Frankly, I like it somewhere in the middle.
Left unchecked, the health care sector will be the the next big bubble to burst in the U.S. (post tech, banks, Treasuries). Here in the PetroMetro, there are dozens of construction sites for health care facilities in anticipation of all the baby boomers getting old. It’s similar to the banks from ’01-’08–building retail locations on every corner. We’ll be awash in skyscraper hospitals with no one to staff them. We don’t teach/train enough doctors and we can’t shove enough poor souls through community nursing schools fast enough. Nevermind that patients won’t have enough money/insurance to go to these new granite cathedrals of illness and disease.
Just wait until the merger of the Big Three — finance, health care and the correctional system. You’ll go to the bank to withdraw a few thou’ to buy a loaf of Rainbo and a jar of Skippy, they’ll beat the shit out of you and take the money back, then treat you for your injuries. Complain and it’s 30 days in the hole.
Patrick:
I’m sure there’s a service charge in there for the privilege of being beaten. This, of course, is not included in the charges for the treatment from the beating. That’s extra, and found in the client agreement you signed when you opened the account with the bank that changed names three times in the last 18 months.
I think I like my chances of just stealing the bread and peanut butter.
For those unfortunates without banking insurance, the cost of the post-withdrawal beating will be $5,000. With insurance, that cost drops to $75, leaving the victim — er, customer — with a co-pay of $1.50.
Of course, if you already have an account with the financial institution, that qualifies as a pre-existing condition and renders you both uninsurable and eligible for another pricey beating.