Is the Health Care Industry a Net Drain on the U.S. Economy?

I was an example today of something you touched on in your column, Scott, when I ran across a copy of the New York Times published about the time I entered the work force. Over the subsequent years the median income has approximately doubled, while the cost of the daily NY Times has increase by an astonishing TEN TIMES!

While it is clear that the responsibility for voraciously consuming family income belongs to runaway inflation, and thus the "Largesselators" in the U.S. Congress, a large degree of the blame rests squarely on papers like the New York Times. Therefore, and given the vital nature of current news in the intellectual and political life of the nation, it seems we've reached the point where the price of the daily paper should be regulated to more reasonable levels, perhaps one and a half times the former price, perhaps even double under certain conditions. This would not affect the reporter-reader relationship any more than doing the same to health care would affect the Doctor-patient relationship; the result would simply be a system in which everyone, whether rich or poor, would have access to their fair share of news.

single-payer system where the gov't could negotiate for prices? The Medicare law prevented the gov't from negotiating for lower pharmaceutical prices because of the obvious profit motivations of some supporters. And the administrative costs of having to deal with multiple codes from multiple insurance providers is a significant cost.

In addition, a single-payer system would relieve businesses from having to pay for a large part of the benefits that having employees cost. This would help keep/bring back jobs to America.

But there is a price here. You cannot adequately fund domestic needs with an ever bloating military budget.

Caday5 writes: "... a single-payer system would relieve businesses from having to pay for a large part of the benefits ..."

Sadly untrue. While it's a fact that government can and does sometimes simply print money, what it spends is ultimately extracted from taxpayers. In the end, most of those taxes come, not from 'the rich' nor from 'evil corporations' but from common citizens who purchase goods and services and most of whom work for a living.

Not only would a single-payer system not 'relieve businesses from having to pay' -- it would require them to pay more in both direct and indirect taxes. This would particularly impact the small businesses which employ most Americans, unquestionably driving many out of business, leaving more Americans unemployed, and reducing overall tax revenues. We're already seeing this all over the country; single-payer tax-supported health care would worsen the situation.