Healthcare Slaves

Walking on the streets
It's really all the same
Selling souls, rock-n-roll
Any other day
--Huey Lewis and The News

David Stockman shares an interesting chart that contrasts government vs out-of-pocket healthcare expenditures.

Since 1960, government healthcare spending has increased from about 15% to about 50% of total expenditures, while out-of-pocket spending has fallen from about 48% to 10%.

As Stockman correctly observes, healthcare markets no longer do what they do best--efficiently allocate scarce resources--when buyers no longer have out-of-pocket incentive to seek satisfaction at prices perceived as attractive. Lower quality, less innovation, less capacity, higher prices are predictable and inevitable under these circumstances.

What he doesn't note is the moral decline that accompanies the above trends. More government spending and less out-of-pocket spending on healthcare essentially means that more people are being forced to produce healthcare goods and services for others. The above chart suggests that nearly half of all healthcare output is produced under conditions of force.

More people are being enslaved as healthcare resource providers.