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Silly quote of the day

July 20, 2009

David Cay Johnston on health care spending in Tax Analysts ($link):

Other countries have all realized that buying healthcare wholesale, through government, is cheaper than buying it retail through a hodgepodge of employer-based plans that create the illusion that healthcare is a tax-free benefit.

You mean, like Medicare? Yes, that's sure a fiscal winner.

Will Wilkinson gets it right:

Of course, the government, like individuals and families, has a limited budget. So if the government is going to pay for medical care, it has to ration. And that very fact is an argument for limiting the government to only paying for the care of people who are unable to pay for a minimum of care themselves.

Unless, of course, you want the Bureau of Surgery to decide that your mother doesn't really need that hip replacement, because she has a perfectly good wheelchair.