While I was writing a response to a conservative friend concerning the ACA, it suddenly occurred to me that the entire debate (it seems like such an inadequate word) over the ACA, should we “replace it” with a GOP alternative, or just repeal the ACA, or whatever, whatever, anyways, it tends to lead a trifling bit more of credence to one of my favorite hobby horses: the sectors of society.
Hey, I write this blog to expiate my demons, not feed yours.
So, let’s throw some facts against the wall. First, the GOP would prefer to let the free enterprise / private sector take care of the health sector, on the basis of their faith that the private sector makes everything more efficient, and on a hidden assumption that everyone’s motivated by money, since that’s the grease of the private sector machine.
So, presumably all those money-motivated medical professionals should be against the ACA, no? After all, in the long run it promises to shrink the revenue to the medical sector. Why? The ACA brings insurance to everyone, one way or another, and part of that insurance is to make it quite cheap to get regular medical checkups; by doing so, many diseases and even injuries are caught earlier, and it’s a common rule of thumb that catching a problem early means fixing it is cheaper.
A lot cheaper. And this will important because, demographically, we’re aging, and medical care costs more as we grow older.
But those medical professionals, are they happy about the proposed demise of the ACA? From WaPo:
Major associations representing physicians, hospitals, insurers and seniors all leveled sharp attacks against the House GOP’s plan to rewrite the Affordable Care Act on Wednesday, as some Republicans publicly questioned whether the measure can clear the House of Representatives.
While industry groups warned that the proposal could leave vulnerable Americans with fewer protections than they now have, GOP leaders pressed ahead, bringing legislation before two key committees that are expected to approve the bills by week’s end. They were also working in concert with the White House to win over conservatives, who have complained that the proposal preserves too much of the current law.
In order for a sector, in the theory I’ve tried to articulate on this blog, to have a purpose, a goal, the members of that particular sector must share that purpose. Not necessarily unanimously, but certainly overwhelmingly. So if the motivator of most medical professionals was money, you’d expect to see them applaud the GOP‘s proposal to repeal the ACA and let the free market deal with the health sector.
But medical professionals won’t have anything to do with it. Their purpose isn’t to make money; oh, sure, it’s fine to do so, but in most cases that’s secondary. Their purpose is to fix people. As an example, I have a family member who’s a medical professional, and she says that when she was in college, she was just looking for some way to help people as her career, and that’s how she ended up as a psychologist. It wasn’t the money, it was the chance to help. To fix people.
So when I say that different sectors have different purposes, the reactions of the various medical groups is one of those little bits of proof. And it doesn’t take an overwhelming amount of intellectual effort to realize that the methods of one sector are optimized to accomplish the purpose of that sector – and may actually be completely inappropriate to another. In fact, I think it takes some sadly magical thinking to believe that privatization of legitimate functions of other sectors is a good idea as a blanket policy. Each scenario needs examination; perhaps folks brighter than I (or at least who are being to think about it 🙂 can work out theories and guidelines for making those judgments.
OK, I’m in the saddle and off to heard the cattle about.
