“An economics professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had once failed an entire class.
That class had insisted that Obama's socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, "OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama's plan".
All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A.
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B.
The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.
As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D!
No one was happy.
When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.
The scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.”
From an e-mail from Sue Davids, with thanks.
I have heard variants of this yarn for many years and believe it is based on true story. Certainly, it reflects great truths, going back to the early miseries of Jamestown Settlement and the very beginnings of this country. The collective nature of Jamestown’s organization and the fact that many in the group were “gentlemen” unused to work and hard labor and insistent that others serve them almost doomed the enterprise. Indeed, had it not been bailout out by the Pocahontas and the Indians. Without this help from the outside, which lasted until more commercial arrangements replaced its initial communal focus, Jamestown would have perished.
So it is with the current American flirtation with socialized medicine. For the moment, emphasis is on the benefits to be received by many not now integrated into the economy and contributing little to covering its costs while at the same time attention is directed away from the sacrifices to be placed upon those carrying the burden of its expenses. Later, when the full negative impact of the mammoth changes to be introduced falls on those who pay the bills and enjoy the best medical care in the world, they will react like the students above and the more hard-working settlers at Jamestown. The quantity and quality of health care in the U.S. will deteriorate markedly.
Social experiments in collectivism never end well and can never be sustained for long without external funding. In the case of American socialized medicine the only source of external funding are the Chinese and the oil producers, and it is my suspicion they will not be willing to finance the Federal budget deficit much longer.
For those who do not believe the health care plans now discussed in Congress represent socialized medicine my response is let us not quibble about words when it is ideas that matter. There is no question about the road Congress is taking and no doubt about where it is headed. One only has to read Hayek to understand the inevitability of it all.
But at the same time, as shown by Jamestown and reflected in the unforgettable words of Herbert Stein, economist and father of the entertainer Ben Stein, “If something cannot go on forever, it will stop”. Hayek would agree. Stein’s Law underlies all public policy initiatives, health care being no exception. If the current version of “health insurance reform” is passed it will not be too many years before its growing difficulties cause the American health care system to be radically altered back toward its more market-oriented present version. It is not simply that the current plans are not fiscally sustainable, and they are not. More importantly, they are not socially acceptable in their distribution of benefits and burdens.
I doubt Congress can pass meaningful health care legislation this year or any year along the lines of the present health care bills. The great costs and limited benefits should be obvious to all. Even if Congress does vote for one of the present plans, the legislation will not define American health care over the longer-term. It will simply create greater problems which we will have to address in the future, and the direction of change will be back to what we have now, perhaps with the minor changes that should have been the focus of Congress’ attention.
Thanks again to Sue for the Tdj.
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