What are the pros of socialized healthcare?

Question

The PROS, not the CONS, please. I'm already aware of the cons.

Answer 1

Currently, the system rations care primarily to the citizens with the highest marginal product of labor. These people, the doctors, engineers, lawyers and business owners, add the most to society, but are not likely very ill. If they were ill, they likely would be in less demanding professions, producing less and making it more challenging for their employers to pay for health care.

The people most likely to be ill are the poor and those whose labor product is small, the working poor. Because we have a shortage of doctors and nurses, health care rationing is mandatory, under both the current system and any national system. The reason the price of insurance and care in general is high is that the demand is very high compared to what the system can handle. It will worsen as boomer doctors and nurses retire. It is being strained in America by a labor shortage, undersubsidizing Medicare/Medicaid, weight gain in America driving higher demand, and higher national personal incomes by a higher percentage of the population. We are short supply and long in demand.

The pro would be to cease treating those most able to pay to those who are sickest. This would mean treating a smaller group of people than are now treated, but essential care would happen for everyone. Unessential care, such as hip replacement surgery to eliminate pain and increase mobility, or treatment of low success illnesses like cancer would cease. The system would switch to a triage system, where outcomes and severity matter more than capacity to pay.

This is a more rational system if fairness rather than freedom and capacity were the criterion.

Answer 2

Actually, if a socialized health system is properly designed and implemented (which includes public investment in training and infrastructure), with appropriate governance and control mechanisms (which usually means that all the people concerned, doctors, patients, compamies, labs, work together through representatives), there are no cons other than what I would consider trivial moral issues (a so-called deprivation of freedom).
It is both more efficient and fairer than a privatized one.

There are numerous reasons for this, all largely documented, I'll give you a few:
- there is no such thing as market mechanisms when dealing with health, as the suppliers have a tremendous influence on the demand (the doctor tells you what treatment you need, you don't decide it by yourself).
- a socialized system saves a lot in advertizing (and can spend the communication budget on prevention...)
- insane insurance policies are not necessary (as long as professionalism is widespread amongst doctors, and as long as there are means to make sure the doctors are extremely qualified and reasonably honest, which is what happens when the doctors belong to a "profession", and are not mercenaries)

If you're looking for actual facts or data, the classic example is France, whose socialized system is regularly quoted as the best in world (for the quality of the healthcare as well as the outreach).
On the other hand, the US system is the most expensive (expenditures per inhabitant), but low ranked because of very limited outreach.

The British NHS provides some kind of counter-example (it doesn't work too well...), but its turmoils are explained more by underinvestment than by failure of the system itself (the problem of "Beveridgian" systems is that ressources are budgeted like any other government expenditures, so it get screwed if a government fails to invest in it for some time).

Answer 3

Pros:

The poor don't have to worry about whether or not they can get treated for something serious.

The working class don't have to spend half their income on insurance. (okay, maybe this is an exaggeration, but not by much.)

The middle class has more disposable income, and stimulates the rest of the economy.

People will likely be healthier.

There will likely be less incentive to stay at a job just for insurance, and thus more freedom to choose your own destiny.

Elderly workers can just quit and retire, instead of working a lousy job in order to get-- you guessed it!

Crappy insurance companies won't call the shots about whether people live or die.

Healthcare will be accountable to EVERYONE and not just to stockholders.

Need I go on?

Answer 4

There are no PROs without CONs. For everything you give someone, you need to take away from someone else.

TANSTAAFL

(There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.)