Spending on Health Care...a Bad Thing?

Why is everyone bitching about the ever increasing cost of health care: as in the panicky statement: "We are now spending one-sixth of our Gross Domestic Product on health care. (Gasp!)" Shouldn't spending on health care be a good thing? What should we be spending our money on: more football games? Trips to Vegas? More credit card debt? Higher alimony payments?

Higher health care expenditures produce productivity gains: A healthier citizenry can work longer; they can work harder, better, their mind unshackled by disease, pain and days off. Isn't that a good thing? Isn't that the proper goal of any investment (which in a sense, consumption on health care really is)? The whole society benefits from that increasing focus and spending on a healthy body.

We keep talking about spending more and more on education and government (at least Democrats do). Aren't all three the same thing? A healthy mind and a healthy body (personal and politic) all contribute to a healthier citizenry.

Granted, like any investment, we want health expenditures--and, for that matter, educational and governmental expenditures--to be more efficient, with greater bang for the buck: greater benefits per dollar of cost. But efficiency and the reduction of waste, fat in any system--health, educational, or governmental--is a separate issue from the general direction of our national focus on better and better health.

I say: let efficient health care costs rise and rise in proportion to educational and/or governmental costs. And then let the most efficient and productive horse among the three win. What a wonderful way to spend wisely our collective dollars!