Monthly Archives: November 2013

The title of one of Ayn Rand’s collections of political and philosophical essays, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, expresses her frustration at the public’s shocking ignorance of the ethical foundations of capitalism. Since its publication in 1967, I daresay that the situation has only gotten worse, as demonstrated by the politics surrounding our healthcare system.

I am not a consequentialist, so my criticism of our system–as modified by the ACA–is not that it is enormously wasteful, inefficient and riddled with fraud, although it certainly is. Rather, I condemn it because it violates the rights of virtually all participants on a massive scale, including laws against the “unauthorized practice of medicine;” nonconsensual participation in Medicare;   tax discrimination against individual insurance plans; insurance mandates, and restrictions on the interstate sale of policies; the FDA’s power to deny competent adults access to medicines they wish to purchase; and so on. Nonetheless, it is typically the case that governmental interference with freedom of contract produces perverse incentives, and medical care is no exception. Continue Reading »