Obama Care will be a pivotal issue in the November 2012 presidential election. Proponents of the program will claim this national healthcare initiative is the preeminent achievement of the administration and is worthy of both admiration and praise. They will assert: public healthcare is a basic human right; costs are a duty productive citizens should bear; and removing the burden of healthcare from industry promotes economic growth. Opponents will argue vehemently that the federal government takeover of healthcare is unwarranted, disingenuous, and ultimately dangerous; declaring centralized control and administration of healthcare is costly, inefficient, and ineffective. Arguments on both sides will be laced with emotion, piled high with heart wrenching personal examples, and, as is typical in most political debates, devoid of fair-minded facts. This spirited debate will be driven by a fundamental flaw: the real issue to resolve is not healthcare, it is profit.
The proper use of public funds for healthcare cannot be determined until the debate adequately addresses this question: Is healthcare about wellbeing or profit?
Political struggles are always about the allocation of resources and the distribution of power. In our increasingly centralized political system all substantive debates revolve around advantaging some and disadvantaging others. Public funding of a profit based healthcare system is a means of channeling private wealth through government to the coffers of well connected, politically influential elite. Make no mistake about it, health and wellbeing do not even register as top tier concerns for industrial, political, and financial interests in this debate. The special interests pushing for public funding of healthcare are seeking to capitalize on an unprecedented profit opportunity.
As long as public funding of healthcare promotes profit, the profit motive and who the government will reward through its policies must be the primary focus of the debate. Politicians are choosing whose coffers to fill and how to extricate funds from the helpless and hapless so as to reward well-connected and politically influential patrons.
Public funding of for-profit healthcare is not about the wellbeing of the populace, access to basic healthcare services, or quality of care. The issue is about who gains and who loses, who the government chooses to support, and who the government chooses to burden. This healthcare debate may prove to be the single most expensive and far-reaching deliberation ever conducted in the public sphere. As long as profit drives the train, the motives of those conducting the debate are suspect. Don't be fooled by partisan rancor about efficiencies or effectiveness, fortunes are at stake. In the final analysis, if profit figures in the equation, the debate is about winners and losers.
With profit as the primary motive, the only thing the American public can rest assured of is the people will lose in the end. Having politicians choose winners and losers is a recipe for disaster. It is time to focus the healthcare debate squarely on the main issue: settling the role profit plays in healthcare. Only after resolving the issue of profit can attention turn appropriately to health and wellbeing.
The proper use of public funds for healthcare cannot be determined until the debate adequately addresses this question: Is healthcare about wellbeing or profit?
Political struggles are always about the allocation of resources and the distribution of power. In our increasingly centralized political system all substantive debates revolve around advantaging some and disadvantaging others. Public funding of a profit based healthcare system is a means of channeling private wealth through government to the coffers of well connected, politically influential elite. Make no mistake about it, health and wellbeing do not even register as top tier concerns for industrial, political, and financial interests in this debate. The special interests pushing for public funding of healthcare are seeking to capitalize on an unprecedented profit opportunity.
As long as public funding of healthcare promotes profit, the profit motive and who the government will reward through its policies must be the primary focus of the debate. Politicians are choosing whose coffers to fill and how to extricate funds from the helpless and hapless so as to reward well-connected and politically influential patrons.
Public funding of for-profit healthcare is not about the wellbeing of the populace, access to basic healthcare services, or quality of care. The issue is about who gains and who loses, who the government chooses to support, and who the government chooses to burden. This healthcare debate may prove to be the single most expensive and far-reaching deliberation ever conducted in the public sphere. As long as profit drives the train, the motives of those conducting the debate are suspect. Don't be fooled by partisan rancor about efficiencies or effectiveness, fortunes are at stake. In the final analysis, if profit figures in the equation, the debate is about winners and losers.
With profit as the primary motive, the only thing the American public can rest assured of is the people will lose in the end. Having politicians choose winners and losers is a recipe for disaster. It is time to focus the healthcare debate squarely on the main issue: settling the role profit plays in healthcare. Only after resolving the issue of profit can attention turn appropriately to health and wellbeing.
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