To Heal Healthcare, Get Government Out

I speak with economist Bob Murphy about what needs to happen in order to heal the deep dysfunction that is healthcare in America. If you think we can "reform" our way out of this mess, you might need to listen to this interview. We unravel the complexities of regulation, the insurance industry, licensing, and what an alternative way might look like.

Bob's book on "surviving the sick-care sinkhole" is here.

The Bob Murphy show is here, and you can find Bob on Twitter here.

My recent episode on medical licensing can be found here, and my September 2021 episode with Keith Smith, of the Surgery Center of Oklahoma, is here.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to the podcast that's all about
solutions.
If you're tired of complainingabout tyranny and you want to
take action to create a freerworld, this is the place for you
.
Join us as we ask what then,must we do?
All right, I'm here again witheconomist Bob Morphe, and we are

(00:29):
here today to talk abouthealthcare.
This is such a huge topic.
There's so much going on andthere's I mean, it was
dysfunctional before COVID andyou know, over the last four
years I think that dysfunctionhas kind of come to the surface
more, but it's also got you know, literally gotten worse.

(00:50):
So it's a little hard to knowwhere to start.
I mean, there's just there's somuch.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
Let me just ask you Well, can I just say something
fast?
Brett, you're just in responseto what you're saying, because
you're right, I co-wrote a bookwith an ER doctor several years
ago.
At this point you're talkingabout the Affordable Care Act,
or what's known as Obamacare,and that I just thought if they
don't get rid of this, it'sgoing to totally drag down the

(01:17):
whole system.
So it's just funny that, yeah,I thought you know it was like
put a fork in it even beforeCOVID hit.
So right.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
I mean, who would have guessed that it could have
gotten you know this much worseand I will link to that.
I'll link to that too.
There are so many issues.
There's medical licensing,there's insurance, there's the
regulatory agencies, there'sObamacare.

(01:46):
If you could sort of articulatewhat needs to happen, where do
we need to be?
Not necessarily how to getthere, but where should we be
aiming?
If we wanted to fix healthcare,make it actually, you know,
functional and so that it'sserving people, what should that

(02:08):
look like?

Speaker 2 (02:10):
Okay, sure, and again , like you say, this is such a
huge topic and I know we don'thave seven hours to go through
this stuff, so it's a little bitdifficult to know where to
begin, how much detail to getinto.
But let me just make someobservations just to kind of
frame the issue.
So you know, nobody says in theUnited States nowadays that you

(02:31):
know, hey, there's a partywe're all meeting at Joe's house
on Friday.
Do you want to swing by?
No, I can't.
Oh, why not?
Because I'm in between jobsright now and so I don't have
car insurance.
You know, because my, you know,my car insurance is tied to my
employer.
So, right, no one talks likethat.
Right, like you can, I mean,unless it was a financial thing.
But the point is, your carinsurance isn't tied to your

(02:52):
employer, but yet it iscommonplace for people to say,
oh yeah, I had this electiveprocedure I was going to have
done, but you know what?
I'm in between jobs, I'mchanging jobs, and so I have to
wait until I get my healthinsurance back.
You know, people do talk likethat, and especially it was true
before the Affordable Care Actwhen you know it was, you

(03:12):
couldn't, you didn't have the,the guaranteed option.
So I'm just, I'm just trying toisolate that something's odd
about that, and so it's when wetalk about these things.
So it's not just a matter ofinsurance, it's, it's something
about health insurance, right?
Because you don't the carinsurance, you have the fire
insurance on your house, thingslike you know, life insurance.
None of those are tied to youremployer.
Those are separate things.
And yet health insurance islike that.

(03:34):
And then also, just to stressthat there's something, I think
part of what's going on rightnow and why the you know the
prices are so crazy and it justit feels like it's a fake system
, is it's not a businesstransaction, that you, as the
patient, you're not the customerof the you know the doctor or
the hospital or wherever you'redealing with you're this

(03:57):
annoying thing, and the actualpeople paying the bills are
combination of the governmentand private health insurers, so
they're the actual customer fromthe point of view of the
medical provider.
And again, you are just, youknow, it's like you're a
six-year-old kid going to aprivate school.
The parents are really thecustomers, the kids, just, you
know, this person that has thisplays some role in the system,

(04:19):
but isn't really relevant, isn'ta decision maker by any stretch
, and that's kind of what'shappening.
And when you think of it thatway, you realize why it's
unfolding like this.
And imagine, just as an analogyyou know, if that was the way
we paid for new cars, that yourjob typically had a program in
place and that every time youneeded a car you just went to
the lot and picked one and thensome third-party insurance

(04:41):
company paid for it andultimately, you know, money was
taken out of your paycheck inorder to fund the premiums for
that, but you didn't directly,and the car dealer would sell
you the car and you wouldn'teven know how much it cost until
after you bought it.
I think in a system like that,the quality of the cars would be
lower and the prices would becrazy if you had to buy a car
and you didn't even know howmuch it would be until you

(05:02):
already bought.
And yet that's how ourhealthcare system works right
now.
And so, again, I'm just tryingto ice this.
So it's nothing intrinsic tomedical care per se.
It's this crazy system we haveand that's what's producing
these.
And the way to realize it's notabout medical care per se is if
you you know there's likestrictly cash practices like
Keith Smith of the OklahomaSurgery Center or other things

(05:23):
that are real.
You know, like certain types ofcosmetic surgery that aren't
typically covered by insuranceand it's just a cash thing.
You know, like the laser eyesurgery things that you know and
I can get at the mall orsomething as they get better,
those types of things that thatseems like a normal business.
Like you go into a waiting room, it's very pleasant, you don't
have to wait two hours to get in, you get in and get out, you

(05:45):
know it's cash boom.
And why is that?
It's because, again, that'slike a real business.
You are the patient, you're thecustomer, you're the client,
you know it's all rolled intoone.
And that's why it seems like anormal business, where it's the
other system, where it's thepayments, disconnected from you
as the customer, that I thinkgives these perverse outcomes.

(06:08):
So I just want to kind of frameit like that to get people to
realize that it's not thatthere's a problem with
healthcare per se because of itsnature.
It's the way the system isdealing with it that's producing
these weird outcomes.

Speaker 1 (06:19):
Yeah, and it's also a little weird that we call it
insurance, because it's notinsurance in the traditional
sense, is you pay some premiumin order to protect yourself
against some unforeseen outcome,and that's not really what
you're doing with healthinsurance.
So even that it's like, well,we call it insurance, but it's

(06:40):
really this weird system we got.
It's not quite socializedmedicine, it's not quite
government provided healthcare,it's not that, but it's also not
insurance.
So it's this whole, it's thisweird sort of thing that we've
got going.
So okay, so that's one thingthat maybe we should do away

(07:00):
with that.
But then we've got, like theseregulatory agencies, and RFK
Junior, for example, is runningon this platform of reforming
healthcare, medical freedom,bringing choice back to
individuals, and he talks abouthow he's going to clean up the

(07:21):
regulatory agencies.
Is that something he can do?

Speaker 2 (07:29):
I mean, I don't know in terms of like what his exact
proposals are, and if you meanlike with the president, have
the authority to do that or youknow what he need congressional
approval, that stuff I'm not assure of.
But in terms of like anincoming administration, if it
had the cooperation of Congress,you know what sorts of things
could they do.
That, yeah, and a lot of thisall ties together.
So partly why just to go backto your earlier point, you're

(07:51):
right, it's.
It's not like you go in everytime you get an oil change and
tires rotated, that your carinsurance pays for that.
And if it did, then your carinsurance premiums would be a
lot higher.
Right, and that's so you.
So you're right that it we aregetting this, and partly why
that happens is because normalmedical care now is so expensive
that a lot of people like youknow, jeez, I can't do both.

(08:12):
I can't pay these huge premiumsand, you know, pay out of
pocket, except for catastrophicthings.
That's why you get in this likesort of worst of both worlds,
where you're paying really highpremiums, plus there's still a
big deductible, but then youknow so, if, if we could bring
down the cost of the actual, youknow, medical services, then
that would make it moreaffordable and so people

(08:33):
wouldn't, you know, needinsurance to cover so much.
So a lot of this of all kind ofyou know plays together that if
you had an improvement one area, that would help improve the
other side to.
But yeah, answer your question.
I mean, for example, the FDA,and I know, brittany, that I
think probably we would say alot of the treatments being
brought to market bypharmaceutical companies are

(08:55):
actually not good for people,but in the, to the extent that
some of them may be, the amountthat's paid like to bring a new
drug to market now it's over abillion dollars research and
it's not because you knowthey're doing so much testing
and it's because of the hurdlesand everything and they have to
like it's, you know.
Analogy is people are saying tolike if an oil company is

(09:17):
drilling for oil, like theydrill a bunch of test wells
because they don't know exactlywhere the deposits are and then
once one hits, then they reallydevelop that one.
So it's like wise, the drugcompanies have lots of different
things in play and then onlysome of them are going to hit
and finally make it over thehurdle, that which can take
several years to then be able tobring it to market.
And so again it's a viciouscycle where that's partly why

(09:39):
they have to charge so much forthe ones that do make it, and it
also means they're only goingto develop products that you
know have a wide market, thatsomeone's got some kind of you
know rare disease.
There's no money to be made.
But again, that's not just a,that's capitalism for you,
that's no, that's hyperregulated capitalism, you know.

(10:00):
So that's that's part of it too.
And, by the way, to also the FDAmakes mistakes coming and going
, that not only do they put up alot of barriers for things that
you know could potentially behelpful, but they also approve
things that they shouldn't haveapproved.
So, like viacs is the classicexample and I'm just saying that
because a lot of times, like alot of free market economists, I

(10:22):
think, fall into the trap ofjust complaining about look at
all the roadblocks the FDA isputting.
But again it's the oppositeerror to where the public thinks
something safe because the FDAsaid so and it gets approved,
and then the institutionalincentives are in place.
If the FDA approved somethingthey don't want to then later
backtrack because it looks likethey made a mistake and then any
deaths that occurred were theirfault.

(10:43):
You know, as it were, so thisperverse thing where they give
their blessing to something andthen are very reluctant to admit
when they were clearly wrongand they shouldn't have done
that.
So it's really like I say, theproblem on both ends of the
spectrum for that and so thingslike that.
You know, medical licensing,not a lot of that.
Yes, it's like at the statelevel how that works, but I mean

(11:06):
people can see it withsomething goofy, like like
African hair braiding.
There's cases where the localregulators you know the other
hairstylist won't let someoneopen up a shop and do that.
You can't get a license.
And clearly that's not becausethey're protecting the public
from incorrect hair braiding.

(11:26):
It's they're protecting theirown turf and they're raising,
you know, their own revenues.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
When medical licensing was first proposed,
when the AMA came in and startedreally pushing for it, they
were explicit that that wastheir goal.
They were explicit in sayingthat.
You know, our doctors aren'tmaking enough money.
They're not, you know, beingtreated as the you know, the
Paragonist society that theyshould be.
They don't have their properplace in economic life.

(11:53):
We've got to put a stop to this.
We've got to cut down thenumber.
You know there are way too manydoctors for the population.
That was their goal.
It wasn't about safety.
It wasn't about all the stuffthat you know is now used to
justify licensing.
It's they were.
They were really upfront aboutthat.

Speaker 2 (12:09):
Right, just like like during the Great Depression.
You know a lot of the officialrationale some of the New Deal
policies was expressed likerailing against cutthroat
competition, you know.
Oh, and how can legitimatebusiness people, you know, earn
a living when you've got theseother people coming in and
dumping in the market?
So you're right, they're thesame.
Like they were literally sayingyou know, we want to restrict

(12:29):
competition, to raise pricesthat the public has to pay for
these goods and services.
And yet, you know, they weretrying to frame it like they
were the heroes.
So yeah, and that's some of thestuff I cover.
You know, in the book that Imentioned was like the Flexional
Report came out and really gotthe public up into a tizzy and
tried to justify hey, we need tohave higher state and in the
abstract, you know, that soundsgreat to have high standards.

(12:50):
A good analogy that I thinkMilton Friedman came up with.
That I think is pretty good inthis context I don't know if he
was talking about healthcare perse or he was talking about
something else, but I adapted itfor this that you know, if
supposed to government passed alaw saying any new car has to be
a Mercedes or better, or, youknow, cadillac or better,
whatever good, nice car you wantto pick, so yeah, there's a

(13:14):
sense in which, oh well, that'sgood, so that everyone who's
driving is in this really nicevehicle and that's pretty good,
right.
But then of course, thedownside is that means the cars
are going to be more expensive,and so now there's plenty of
people who could have afforded,you know, a less fancy car.
Now they got to take the bus orsomething because they just
don't have a car period and solikewise yes, other things equal

(13:34):
if there's a rule saying foranyone to practice medicine they
have to meet these minimumstandards, and if you make the
standards more stringent thanassuming they made sense, like
we're kind of giving the benefitof the doubt, then yet on
average anybody seeing a doctor,you'd be more certain that that
doctor's service, you know,would be qualified and it would
be good, but it would be moreexpensive because you're

(13:55):
restricting the supply.
And so it's not obvious, evenif you did it right, that you're
helping people on that Because,again, anyone who wanted to
really you know people couldvoluntarily do it.
Someone who said, no, I'mwilling to pay more to go to a
doctor who went to a legitschool and I know you have the
freedom to do that if thegovernment isn't enforcing it,
right.
But what they are doing isthey're taking away the option

(14:16):
of people of paying a loweramount for a doctor that maybe
doesn't come from the school.
But what's funny is I almostdon't want to follow the trap of
saying that, because that makesit sound like they're legit in
great medical care now becausethe government has those
standards in place.
But that's obviously not thecase, why would we expect a
bunch of politicians to know howto pick doctors better than

(14:37):
people left to their own devices?
So again, like I say with theFDA, with the Viac scandal just
showing the problem's not merelythat, oh, they're making
medical care too good and tooexpensive.
No, they're making it expensive, that's for sure.
But it's not obvious that thequality of care is better now
than in a system where we hadmore, like you know, private
watchdogs.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
Yeah Well, and you mentioned the Flexnew report.
I mean, it's pretty clear inhindsight, you know when you
look at how that was implemented.
You know when the report cameout, basically it was damning
against everyone who wascompeting against the
pharma-centric school of thought, and so they shut down what's

(15:19):
now considered sort ofalternative medicine.
They also shut down schoolsthat were teaching African
Americans and women.
Those, you know, happened to bethe ones that didn't meet the
standards.
So just historically, you know,I don't, I don't it's hard to
make the argument that it was,that it was about improving
standards or that regulationactually improved standards.

(15:40):
But I think your point's reallyimportant.
Even if it, even if that iswhat it was doing, even if it
was raising this bar and saying,well, if you're going to be in
the market, you've got to meetthis high standard, you're then
cutting a bunch of people out.
You're cutting out a bunch ofcustomers, the example that
comes to mind.
So when I lived in Hong Kong,there was the walled city, was

(16:04):
this place where it was like ano-man's line.
It wasn't ruled by China orGreat Britain, it was just this
free place.
On the bottom level there wereall these unlicensed dentists
who would come in from China andset up shop, totally not
licensed, and if you had aproblem with them, I don't know
how they would even deal withthat, because Hong Kong didn't

(16:25):
have jurisdiction over them.
Nobody had jurisdiction overthese dentists.
Yet they were doing a thrivingbusiness because there were
enough people who wanted to paybargain basement prices to come
and get their teeth fixed.
Apparently they did a goodenough job that they were still
in business, but completelyunregulated, unlicensed.

(16:50):
Why shouldn't there be thatoption?
Why shouldn't people be able togo and yell all go to Joe's GP
practice care, who just read itabout on the internet and put
together his own practice andhe's going to charge a dollar an
hour.
Why shouldn't people have thatoption, as crazy as it sounds?

(17:10):
Because, as you say, there'sstill the other option you can
still pay and get better qualitycare this idea that people
shouldn't have the option tochoose shoddy service should
they want to.
But I also am wary of sayingtoo much about that argument
because it presumes that whatregulation does is up the

(17:34):
quality.
I don't think there's anyevidence for that.

Speaker 2 (17:38):
Great points.
Let me just respond to a fewthings you said.
On the point about in the wakeof the Flexin report, they were
shutting down, I guess like whatwe say homeopathic.

Speaker 1 (17:49):
Homeopathy and Native American.

Speaker 2 (17:52):
And that some of the people caught up in that tended
disproportionately to be the notas powerful people at the time,
and that makes sense.
So there's a similar thing.
In 1931, they passed the wasthe Davis Bacon Act, and if you
just read the text of it it saysoh, you know, for government

(18:12):
projects they have to pay theprevailing local wages, you know
?
In other words, you know so thegovernment wants to go build a
bridge or something somewhereand they're taking up bids from
the local contractors.
And the idea was, if acontractor comes in with a low
bid but you look and see he'snot paying the prevailing wages
of that region, you can't takethat bid, you know.
So it's not just the lowest bid.

(18:32):
And so, oh yeah, that's that'sgood for helps the workers.
And what that was doing, it wasmaking sure just white union
workers got the contracts right,because that, you know, the
union like determine what theprevailing wage was.
And so if you were, you know, ablack crew that wasn't
unionized, how would you compete?
Well, you know, your menprobably didn't have the

(18:53):
experience and the training thatthe white guys did in 1931.
You know, it's no fault oftheir own.
And so how would you competewith them, you'd have to do it
for a lower price and yet thegovernment was making that
illegal right and so and thisisn't just pure cynicism, like
you can go see at the time, atleast some of the I'm not saying
everyone who voted for it wasracist, but some of the people

(19:14):
in supporting it you could likeon the house floor or whatever
we're clearly saying you knowthis will ensure that government
, you know taxpayer money goesto.
That are the exact language,but they weren't beating around
the bush, they were explicitlysaying you know so anyway, just
that's one example of this kindof thing that you see this
pattern a lot.
And also to like with the withthe hair braiding example, we

(19:37):
said a minute ago that you knowthat policy obviously is having
disproportionate effects interms of, you know, racial pay
among hairdressers in thatregion.
So, yeah, you're right.
I got just to make sure peoplearen't missing the point that if
the government comes in andsets a threshold, like it
restricts the supply in the inthe name of unaccording to the
rationale of improving quality,even if what they were doing

(20:00):
actually didn't prove thequality, it's not obvious.
That's, you know, helpinganybody Because, again, it's,
you know, the only people youwould be helping are like those
who really have no frame ofreference.
They have no ability orwillingness to judge quality on
their own.
And you know, so that kind ofthing, that maybe you could make
an argument that if there'sthis bare minimum, but like

(20:20):
you're saying, like if they justsaid, hey, you know what we're
going to just randomly say halfof the current brain surgeons
need to drop out, you know thatwould also restrict the supply,
but there's no reason to supposethe half that remained would be
a higher quality than the halfthey kicked out.
And so I'm saying, like, justthe mere fact that you're
restricting supply doesn't provean, especially for people who

(20:43):
now, you know, doing moreresearch and whatever, and it
looks like a lot of thesealternative medical treatments
might make more sense, or atleast for certain people, than
what the you know standardscientific, and this is what you
do and what you got a problemwill go get a pill for you.
You know that, that's right.
You know, oh, changing yourdiet, that's.
You know that's hippie-dippystuff, that like right, it seems
more and more people are real.

(21:03):
But at the point is, it doesn'tmatter, we don't, whether you
think it's not.
It's like the.
Wouldn't the system be morerobust if it were open ended?
And you just said let theevidence go where it may.
And then, yeah, if it does turnout that some of these
therapies are you know, orwhatever, ok, well then people
probably will stop going to himover time.
But you don't want to give thegovernment the power to just

(21:24):
pick and choose.
No, this is the right way.
And you know anyone else iswrong, like once.
You do that if they happen tochoose wrong.
And again, why would we expectpoliticians to pick the right
ones, even if they wanted to?
They're no more trained thanright, even if it's not corrupt.
And.
But yeah, like you say, thenbehind the scenes too, they're
getting, you know, campaigncontributions, the very least

(21:46):
from certain groups.
So why would we expect that tobe an unbiased choice?

Speaker 1 (21:50):
Yeah, and what's interesting to me about that
history is, you know, at thattime, prior to the Flexin report
, the, there was this warbetween, like the, what we now
call the alipaths and thehomeopaths, and the alipaths
being the ones who were startingto use.
You know, back then it wascalled patent medicine.
It's medicine that you couldactually you could patent and

(22:12):
then sell.
What's interesting to me aboutthat is that the economics of
selling patent medicine is verydifferent from the economics of,
like, herbal medicine orhomeopathy or, like you know,
traditional Chinese medicine orso, because you can't patent
those things and so you can'tmake the big profits.

(22:33):
And what it looks to me likewhat happened is these folks who
were making medicines thatcould be patented
pharmaceuticals.
They were able to make a lotmore money, and what they did
was they went to the politiciansand said, hey, can we?
You know, let's have thispartnership and we'll pay you
essentially, which is stillgoing on today.

(22:53):
It seems to me that patents aresort of a central part of that.
Like, if they didn't have thepower to patent their products,
they wouldn't have theseenormous profits which they
could then use.
You know, they have theadvantage, you know, in the
market of buying politicians.
They have the advantage over,you know, the vitamin sellers or
the herbal remedies.

(23:14):
What are your thoughts aboutthat?

Speaker 2 (23:18):
Yeah, it's a great point.
I don't know that.
I've thought of it from thatangle.
But yeah, I think you're rightto understand that history.
And how do they have theability to do that?
I mean, it's funny.
There's a thing in economicscalled Baptists and Bootleggers,
and for people who don't knowthat term, it's an economist
that has studied, like trying toshow historically who were the

(23:38):
groups supporting alcoholprohibition.
You know when that was in force, and he summarized by saying
Baptists and Bootleg.
So Baptists mean of coursethere was the religious, you
know the T-totalers, who reallydidn't want alcohol to be
allowed.
They thought it was bad forsociety and you know against God
and whatnot.
But then the people who were inthe Bootleg industry were
making a bunch of money byselling moonshine and so they

(24:01):
also, behind the scenes, wereactually you know.
So somebody might haveoriginally thought, oh, the
people who'd be most in favor ofdrug legalization would be the
drug dealers.
No, they're the last people,because they know they would go
out of business.
You know, if you're a heroindealer right now, then you're
not going to be the CEO of areputable company 10 years into
it if it's legalized.

(24:22):
It's going to be somebody elsewho's got a different skill set
than you do.
So so, yes, in a similar vein,then you just you know that same
thing, that it's right thepeople supporting and of course
it's not that they need to sendlobbyists who say, hey, we have
these drugs that we just spent abunch of money developing and
so we want you to make itillegal for people to compete

(24:42):
with us, even though our drug isno better than vitamins.
That's not what they're saying.
They're going to give, you know, research and whatnot to try to
make reasoned arguments indefense of the public.
But it's sort of like you know,I think, with a lot of stuff,
bretney, that the rise of Uber,you know, and Lyft and whatnot,
and Airbnb really helps thepublic to see that our arguments

(25:04):
make sense, because we can seein the case, you know, when,
like the taxi cab drivers aresaying, oh no, uber shouldn't be
allowed because you know thepublic, you might get into it,
the guy might be an ex murderer,and people just realize, well,
no, that's not happened.
You know they have a system inplace that you know there's
ratings and stuff.
So if the guy really is aterrible driver or whatever, the
car's awful, you know he'sgoing to be quickly weeded out

(25:27):
of the system and it's just somuch cheaper and convenient.
Anyway, we don't believe you.
The reason you guys arelobbying against Uber is so you
can charge more for cab ride.
That's not because you careabout the public.

Speaker 1 (25:38):
And before over existed.
You know they would make verywell reasoned arguments about
why there had to be thismedallion system and why, you
know, we've got to limit thenumber of taxis.
And I remember writing aboutthis, you know, years and years
ago.
And it's like, you know, whenyou really look at it it
actually doesn't make sense.
But I think until people cansee with their own eyes the

(26:00):
alternative, it's like oh yeah,medallion, that makes a lot of
sense.
You know you got to keep thestreets, you know, clear of all
these cars, can't have too manytaxis.
All the sudden it's like butonce you see, you know the, once
the reality changes and you see, oh, it's working just fine
without that.
It seems ridiculous.

Speaker 2 (26:20):
Yeah, and so, again, like I understand people I'm
guessing the listeners of youraudience, breton, you are pretty
open minded about this stuff,but like the average person, I
get it.
If they heard our discussionfrom 10 minutes ago, I would
think so you, anybody can just,like you know, put sign on their
window saying brain surgeon $10a pop and the public's going to
go.
And so, first of all, probablyyou know somebody who would

(26:42):
willing to go to just somerandom person on the street and
get a brain surgery done.
You know that's the hey.
They probably got a brain tumor, but beyond that, that you know
, like you're.
So, where you're going to go,you're going to go to a hospital
, they're going to have brain,so the hospital is not going to
hire Joe Schmoe, you know, whofailed out of high school to be
given brain surgeries.

(27:02):
You know in their ER, becausein the hospital, even if there's
not medical liability, theyjust they're going to go out of
business, right, if we'retalking about a more, you know,
business oriented system, and soI guess.
So some of these crazy cases,and, like you said, you know,
for something that's less risky,like just having somebody check
, you know, oh, wow, my tooth iskilling me.
I need someone.
You know, like you're talkingabout Hong Kong, well then,

(27:23):
there maybe you would take thechance of doing something.
And if you have a bad thing,well, the person's not going to
die.
And then they're going to tellall their friends and then we're
going to minimize the damage.
And again, you can always comeup with scenarios where
something bad is going to happen.
But bad things happen with thecurrent system.
Right An example people mightrealize that there's been a
proliferation at least whereI've been living in the last

(27:45):
several years of urgent carecenters, and you need those had
to spring into existence becausenow, even if you have a
pediatrician and your kids sick,you can call them up and
they're like, yeah, we can seein three weeks.
And there's like, well, the kidssick right now, it's all.
You take them to urgent care,you know.
So I'm just saying, and thestandards, I think, for that are
lower than other thing peoplemight be worried about.

(28:06):
Oh, but you know what?
If your kids sick, you needsomeone to see them and it's.
You know you can turn to Google, but you know some.
And also, too, I should mentionlast thing I know I've been
going here, but part of whyeveryone has to go to see
somebody is because you can'tjust get prescriptions filled
without having a doctorprescribe them.
So that's part of what keepseveryone locked into this crazy

(28:27):
system too is that, if you knowif you had more for it.
It's not just like my wife hada certain thing she needed for a
nebulizer for she's the lungissues, and when we were
traveling in Europe she ran lowand I was like, oh no, what are
we going to do?
And we just went down to thepharmacy and they gave it to us.
I mean, we paid for it, but wedidn't need a doctor to give us
a, whereas in the US you wouldhave needed a prescription to

(28:49):
get that refilled.
So I'm just saying things likethat, and people might have been
surprised by that, thinking ohyeah, socialized.
Well, in at least the countrywe were in at the time, it was
easier to get stuff there thanin the good old United States
with its wild Western healthcare.

Speaker 1 (29:02):
Right, and let's just talk a little bit about the
whole the whole prescriptionthing.
I mean, it's something thatpeople, I think, don't really
question, but I think it'sinsane that I have to go to
another adult to get permissionto get medications for my child
or for myself.
I think that's insane.
And yet here we are and, as yousay, what happens if you need

(29:29):
something urgently?
We actually had a thing come uprecently where we got sent the
wrong medication and then ittook several days.
We had to give our daughter thewrong medication for a few days
and it caused problems and it's.
I mean, I'm just sitting herethinking I should be able to
just go to the store and buythis and get as much of it as I
want and have it on in stock soI don't have to wait until my

(29:51):
permission clears.
And I mean, it's just when youthink about it, it's pretty nuts
.
And yet people have come toaccept it.
Why does that even exist?

Speaker 2 (30:04):
Yeah, and just to get one specific illustration of
just the absurdity and thehorror, I think for certain
people chronic pain patientsthey really have had a roller
coaster the last several yearsbecause the opioid crisis and
doctors over-prescribing.

(30:25):
They would say, you know, and Iget that, but then there was the
crackdown on that and so thenyou know, doctors were very
reluctant to prescribe painkillers even to people who just
went through like a bad surgeryor just again, someone who has a
condition where they're reallyconstantly in pain and just to
function and not want to jumpoff a bridge you need.
And a lot of them got you knowcut way down just because the

(30:49):
doctor was afraid.
And no, no, no, if it looks onpaper like I'm just passing out
opioids, I could lose my license, right, so anyway.
So I'm just saying there's lotsof things like that where for
people who are in generally goodhealth, they might not realize
just how crazy some of theseoutcomes in the system are.
And again, this is in theUnited States.
It has this reputation of beinglaissez-faire healthcare.
No, it's not.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
Nothing close to it.
Yeah, nothing close to it.
Yeah, it's.
Yeah, if you're in good health,I think you don't realize how
much control they have and how,when you really need something,
you're at their mercy.
You're really, you are, and youknow.
You mentioned licensing againtoo.
I think we've seen over the lastfew years how licensing is

(31:32):
really used as a tool of control, how it's really, you know, as
with you know, the FDA oranything else.
I don't think it has anythingto do with quality.
It has to do with this is a waythat we can make sure that
doctors toe the line.
You know, specifically in thelast few years with regard to,
like, unapproved treatments forCOVID, ivermectin, that kind of

(31:55):
thing.
I don't know if you've beenfollowing the case of Meryl Nass
in in, but she lost, she hadher license stripped because she
was giving ivermectin topatients, because she was
basically trying to save theirlives.
Other doctors have had theirlicenses threatened because they
talk about the risks of theCOVID vaccine, or you know

(32:15):
things that are clearlypolitically motivated, that are
like you know, you're not towingour line and so we're going to
take away your permission.
You know again, why does anyonehave that power?

Speaker 2 (32:27):
And it was on the going the other way too.
Bretany, maybe this is on yourradar too, but in the beginning,
you know, when COVID firststarted becoming a thing, there
were some researchers off thetop of my head, I don't remember
the details in the UnitedStates so that they had what
they thought were, you know,rough and ready COVID tests.
You know so the all the peoplesaying, oh right, when, when an
outbreak begins, if you couldjust isolate it and contain the

(32:49):
people, you would save so manylives.
And Donald Trump just sat andrefused to do it.
And no, what happened early onwas there were some people who
had, you know, crewed testsready to start testing people in
the FDA.
Well, I think it was the FDAtold them no, you're not allowed
to use those tests, you have touse the ones that we approve.
And so the people you know again, this is narrative has just

(33:11):
arisen from the left about theUS did nothing and, you know,
put their head in the sand.
And no, some people were tryingto do early reaction and the
government literally told themyou are not allowed to test
people and and you know itwasn't like they were going to
be quarantined.
There was no, there was nocoercive power, it was just a
matter of hey, there's this newthing and it would probably help

(33:32):
if some people we could tellthem you tested positive, maybe
you want to stay home, you know,not that we're going to force
you to, but just so you know youtest the positive for this
thing that we think came overand could be a deal.
And no, the government said no,no, you're not allowed to do
that.
Yeah, the tests that wedeveloped.

Speaker 1 (33:47):
Yeah, yeah, I remember that there were several
labs that had developed andthere were, they could use them
internally.
They just couldn't ship themout, they couldn't let anybody
else.
It was yeah, yeah.
So you know, assuming thosetests were a good thing to have,
not so sure now, but you knowlike I said yeah, I realized you
know there was a whole bigthing, but I'm.

Speaker 2 (34:04):
But again, even the people who are trying to say oh,
yeah, it was the inaction, andDonald Trump dragging his feet,
and then say, no, there areseveral things where, even in
your own worldview, thegovernment prevented people from
doing what you would havethought was the right thing.

Speaker 1 (34:15):
So yeah, it's the regulatory state doing what it
does.
What do we do?
What do you think ideally, whatwould have been Sorry?

Speaker 2 (34:31):
can I say one last quick thing?
I knew a guy he's a doctor, Iforget he puts stints in
people's like that, so he's aheart doctor.
And when COVID was firsthitting, he went because he had
contacts with people in Chinaand he was going to get what is
a K-95s and masks, which are notthe same thing as a 95.

(34:53):
And so it was right.
You remember when there was ashortage and people were going
into hospitals and puttingtowels around their face and
certain hospitals, and so he waslike, for free, he was going to
give for free.
He was contact like and he hadto.
On Facebook, he had to use codeto tell other people, hey, if

(35:14):
you have a hospital, that'swilling, I have crates full of
K-95s sealed from themanufacturer that I will just
give to you.
And Facebook was shutting it,making it so he couldn't easily
communicate that in all thelocal hospital, like I even
reached out, like I knew somepeople, like through my wife who
worked, and nobody took them upon it, like, no, we're not so

(35:36):
because, no, we need N-95s forthe healthcare workers.
And so it ended up that theywere like, like you said,
reusing masks and we're justputting plastic instead of a
K-95 because no, that's notallowed and it was just insane.
Again, I know there's peoplelike to say with the studies
about the masks.
But I'm just saying even intheir own mind they thought
masks were essential, but no,the rule says it's got to be an

(35:57):
N-95 for the healthcare workers.
So we can't take these.
It was just insane.

Speaker 1 (36:01):
Yeah, yeah, let me just go up on one little tangent
.
It may not be that little, soone of the things that happened
during COVID, it's probablystill happening.
There are all these cases.
I don't know if you've seen allthe accounts of people who were

(36:22):
kind of coerced into takingremdesivir, coerced into being
put on ventilators, not givencare.
What it looks like and I don'twant to get too accusatory, but
what it looks like is thehospitals had financial
incentives to have people diefrom COVID and they were getting

(36:43):
money from the government andthere was specific bits of that
money were earmarked for died ofCOVID.
And so there are these accountscoming out now of people who
were flat out denied care, leftin rooms with starved, no water.
I don't know another word forit than murder.

(37:07):
It looks like people werekilled in hospitals.
In my mind, a healthcare systemdoesn't really get much worse
than that.
That's kind of the worst thingthat can happen, and it looks
like that was happening and babystill is.
I don't know how do you fixthat?

(37:33):
How do we get from this pointof oh my God, look at this
horrific thing that's happeningin this system.
How do you stop that?
How do you fix that?

Speaker 2 (37:47):
Well, I think, taking the coercion out of all of it.
So, all these things we'retalking about, what ultimately
upholds each leg of the systemis the coercion behind it all.
And so, yeah, if the governmentfor the medical licensing, if
the government just wanted topublish a list and say these are
the people we approve of, youcan go to this website.
You want to go to Cease Someone?

(38:09):
Hey, before you go, make thatinitial appointment, why don't
you double check with this listthat we maintain at
wwwblahblahblahgov?
But if you want to see someonewho's not on their list, you
have the freedom to do it.
I'd be okay with that.
I mean, I might spend some.
You know that might taketaxpayer money or whatever, but
it wouldn't be a big deal.
The issue is, no, you're notallowed to go against what they

(38:29):
say.

Speaker 1 (38:30):
To be clear, there are already private
credentialing agencies.
You can get credentials.
You know even you can.
You know you meet yourlicensing standard.
But then you know in whateverspecialty you are you can get
private credentialing in thatalready.
So there's no reason to thinkyou know if there wasn't
licensing that there would bethese credentialing agencies.

Speaker 2 (38:51):
Oh right, totally.
I'm just saying that, like ifthe government feels like, oh no
, the public's too stupid,you're saying that notice the
reason that their licensing hasteeth.
It's not because they're justmaking a recommendation, it's
because they're saying if wecatch you trying to go to a
doctor that we don't approve of,he's in trouble and you're in
trouble possibly.
You know, so that's that's thejust like in other countries,

(39:13):
that where they like in Canadaor whatever, you can't on the
side, even for an approveddoctor, if you're just on the
side want to say, you know,here's some money, can you treat
me, that's they've committed acrime in certain cuts.
You know some.
It's like a hybrid where theyhave a single payer or a
government healthcare system butyou can, on the side, opt out
if you want, but in some of themyou can't.
So I'm just saying that, likethat's here the US has that too,

(39:37):
in the sense of if you're notan approved medical practitioner
, so that's something.
And again, you know, with that'spartly how the government had
such a stranglehold over theacceptable treatments, like you
said, that the case earlier, thedoctor using ivermectin, you
know, losing her license.
So that's the way they canultimately control, and then

(40:01):
that's why you know, geez, ifsomeone's in the hospital and
you go to visit them, for onething you know you might not be
allowed to visit them with thoseprocedures.
So even there you said well,gee, how come someone didn't
open up a different hospitalthat will?
Because you need to show acertificate of need in order to
you know, it's not like justopening up a pizza shop, you

(40:21):
know.
So, again, this, every elementof this whole thing, is tightly
controlled.
It's not a free market.
And so then, given that, whenthe government has such tight
control over it, don't besurprised if then, if you find
yourself not with public opinionon something in public opinion,
of course, is heavily molded bya smaller group then you could
be in trouble.

(40:41):
And that's when you see crazythings like hey, if you're not
vaccinated, you should be deniedmedical care, and that you know
, whereas you know that's comingfrom the open-minded, tolerant
leftists, yeah, so yeah, do youthink?

Speaker 1 (40:58):
you know?
I think if we talked about someof these ideas like five years
ago you know, not havinglicensing and you know not
having government approval ofdrugs and that kind of thing it
would have been dismissed by,you know, people who are not
already on our side.

(41:18):
I feel like most people wouldjust think, oh, there are a
bunch of lunatics.
Do you think that's changed?
Do you think there's an openingto have these ideas heard now?

Speaker 2 (41:27):
Oh, definitely, yeah, people saw how the health care,
you know, the interventions inthe medical sector, could be
weaponized against unpopulargroups, and I think that you
know they've learned that lessonand they're going to.
I mean, arguably.
It's almost the other way that,like now, people are like, hey,
I don't trust anything.

(41:47):
You know viruses exist, and soit's like, yeah, so in terms of
trying to get people to just dowhatever the government wants
and toe the line, it had theopposite effect.
So to answer your question,right, I think, just like we
said earlier, that 20 years agoif you said, oh, you know what,
the taxicab medallion, that's anunwarranted government

(42:08):
intervention and it makes cabrides more expensive and don't
worry, there could be a freemarket and there'd be methods of
private monitoring of thequality and the driver, and that
would sound science fictiony,like who care what's the big
deal.
But once you see thealternative, and so then you
heard somebody who might havethought, oh, the system
basically works, bob, give me abreak.
And then, when you see whathappened, then a lot of people

(42:29):
are taking it more seriously,like, oh, yeah, maybe we
shouldn't put this kind.
You know, it's kind of funnythat you wouldn't want the
government to be just like tohave total control over the food
supply or something.
You know that's kind of anessential thing.
And yet you know they do havethis very strong grip on
healthcare, which is also prettyimportant for people.
It's it's sort of like BrianKaplan one time.

(42:54):
He's a libertarian of cops andhe had this offhand remark on a
blog post about.
You know that.
You know, if you took some ofthe libertarian arguments
seriously, you would think that,like drinking water wouldn't be
something the state couldprovide.
But you know it's basically apretty good.
And then the Flint Michiganthing came out, and so I, you
know I said, oh, actually, no,it's not the case.
The government can.
You don't want them in chargeof your local drinking water?

(43:16):
Yeah, so like you could.
As absurd as you could come upwith, that's what the
government's going to do and youdon't want them in charge of it
.
You don't want them in chargeof your money.
Look what happened.
You don't want them charged theschools.
Look what happened.
You don't want them charged ofhealthcare.
Look what happened.
You don't want them chargedyour drinking water.

Speaker 1 (43:34):
If we waved a magic wand, got government completely
out of healthcare tomorrow, arethere any problems you can
foresee?
Is there anything that wouldhappen?
Or even you know let's say ithappened over, because there's
also the issue of you knowanything that happens
instantaneously.
There's going to be adjustmentissue.
But leaving that aside, ifgovernment wasn't involved in

(43:57):
healthcare at all, can you thinkof any problems, any legitimate
problems that that would create?

Speaker 2 (44:05):
Well, well, certainly , if by saying getting out,
getting it out altogether, youincluded current government
expenditures for healthcare item.
If you turn that off nextThursday, that could lead to a
lot of issues, like people who,right, or you know right now,
like, like older people who have, you know, their whole lives in
terms of budgeting and how muchare we putting aside for our

(44:26):
retirement, whatever, assuming?
Oh, well then I'm going to beon Medicare at that point, like
for them, it would be tricky ifall of a sudden, that got turned
off.
Yeah, like I said, though, alot of this stuff, though I
think one of the I don't want tocall it silver bullet, but if
you got rid of the mandatorylicensing and again the reason
I'm saying the mandatory, I wassaying before about the you know
putting the thing that if thepublic thinks, oh no, we need,

(44:48):
we need some sort of centralauthority to tell us who's a
good doctor, I'm saying, okay,well then they can publish the
list.
They can just say if we, youknow, according, these are the
people that meet our criteria.
So anybody who wants likes thatsystem, you can still go to
just those doctors.
It's just, don't force otherpeople who disagree with you or
who disagree on the tradeoffbetween the price versus the

(45:08):
quality.
Yeah, don't force them intothat same system.
Give them the freedom to optout.
That's all it would mean.
Just like with the FDA, likethere could be.
The FDA could still give itsapproval to certain drugs and
then, you know the CVS orwhatever could have two
different sections.
They could even have it, youknow, the unregistered or
unlicensed ones behind thecounter right and glass or

(45:29):
something, and maybe only sellthose to people who are 21 or
older or something.
But again, it's just the idea.
So you can still have abifurcated system and all the
stuff that you think thegovernment's giving right now.
A lot of that you could getwithout the coercion involved.
So that would bring down prices.
That's where I was going with.
All this is to say.
So that would ease a lot ofthis.
That hardly reason right now itseems like, oh, we need to have

(45:52):
massive health insurancecoverage and government
subsidies is because it's justso expensive.
But no, the reason it's soexpensive is because we've got
this crazy system where again,the customer is not the one
making the decisions, like whenpeople who decide to go get some
tests or whatever.
If you had to pay for out ofpocket all the different MRIs

(46:12):
and whatever, there'd be a lotfewer those ordered.
And I know some of that too islike because of the male
practice issues that a lot oftimes doctors order a bunch of
tests just to have themselvescovered and for there's more
reasonable legal system, maybethat would be lower too.
So anyway, just opening that upa lot, a lot of the prices
would come down, which wouldmake a lot of the other fixes

(46:33):
less painful.
That, oh yeah, you could endgovernment subsidies a lot more
easily if the prices dropped 90%.
And by the way, those numbers Imentioned Keith Smith of the
Oklahoma Surgery Center.
Yeah, that's some of that,because for people who don't
know it's like a cash practiceand on some you know a lot of
procedures.

(46:53):
He says the cost savings are 90, 95% in some cases.

Speaker 1 (46:56):
Yeah, they've documented that and it's.
It's a huge, huge difference.
I mean such a difference.
People frequently fly in fromother parts of the country just
because it's still way, waycheaper, even with your travel.

Speaker 2 (47:09):
Yeah, and even like taking a week at the hotel down
the street to recover from thesurgery and then fly back, even
all all in people savingthousands of dollars and going
and doing that.
And so that kind of mileage ofshows that, at least for a lot
of the more routine procedures,a lot you know the.
So these, these humongousprices, the people, when you go,

(47:29):
you go to the hospital and youcome out you look at the actual
itemized bill and you're justshocked Wow, it's a good thing I
have insurance.
Well, it's partly because youhave insurance the bill is so
high.
If they had to actually get,you know, give that to paying
customers, the prices would haveto come down because nobody
would be paying those figures.

Speaker 1 (47:46):
Yeah, really quick.
I know we've got to wrap uppretty soon Because we're
talking about insurance.
I think there's probably aperception, among some people at
least, that well, that's justthe free market, that's, that's
something the market came upwith.
Why are why?
How did we end up in this weird, with this weird insurance
insurance model?
How did that happen?

Speaker 2 (48:07):
Sure.
So it's great question.
I'll try to give a quick answerAgain.
A lot of it.
This is a great illustration oflittle Venmese's head, this
idea of like the logic ofinterventionism and how one
intervention causes problemsthat then justify the next round
, and then you just keeprationing up, you know, moving
towards outright socialism.

(48:28):
So in health insurance, theUnited States, so one of the
things that happened is, duringWorld War Two there were wage
and price controls, right.
So the government's fightingthe war, the Federal Reserve's
creating boatloads of money topay for it.
They're going through.
You know, the government issuesbonds, the Fed monetized it and
whatever, and so that waspushing up prices.
The government didn't want that.

(48:49):
So they had wage and pricecontrols.
But they had an exception If acompany like offered to cover
someone's health insurance aspart of the compensation package
, that wasn't included with thecap, so that you know companies
bidding for workers in thatperiod couldn't just say, oh,
we'll give you 10% more money,because that would be in
violation of law, but they couldsay, hey, we'll give you this

(49:09):
amount of money in salary andwe'll pay for your family's
health insurance.
So that's partly what, how thatcame to be a thing.
And then you know there's rightnow at the tax code has certain
provisions that also make itadvantageous that if an employer
you know gives you $80,000 incash and $20,000 payment for

(49:33):
your health insurance, that'syou as the employee are only
taxed on the 80%, whereas ifthey just gave you 100 grand in
cash, it's by your own healthinsurance and you spent 20,000,
you'd be getting taxed on that20,000.
And so that's another reasonlike keeping it locked in that,
especially like highercompensation.
Employees would rather theircompensation be, you know,

(49:54):
allocate.
They want the insurance to beprovided by their employer
rather than them getting paidand then they shop around and
they buy it themselves over thecounter.
So things like that just givethem two quick examples to help
show that it's not market forces, it's government rules that
have sort of shepherd us intothis system, and that's that's
part of the explanation for whyit's like that.

(50:16):
And then there's lots of youknow there's rules against
interstate competition andthings like that that you know
help make insurance moreexpensive than it needs to be,
and a lot of stuff to like theportability.
Like you, in principle, youshould be able to buy a real low
frills health insurance planthat just follows you around.
But in practice that's not howyou know.

(50:38):
Kind of renews every year whereit's like you buy a life
insurance policy when you're 25.
And you keep paying thepremiums, even if you develop a
brain tomb or five years later.
As long as you keep makingthose premiums, that policy is
still enforced.
But with a health insuranceit's not like that.
You know it's going to renewsoon enough.
So a lot of those.
And I think again.
I think it's because there'sgovernment rules about what type

(51:02):
of policy you need to have, andcertainly with Obamacare now
Right, certainly after the CAA.
So partly you know if they coulddo things like like, for
example, my first son.
When he was born he had a heartmurmur and I was self employed
at the time.
This was right before Obamacarecame in.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
And.

Speaker 2 (51:22):
I had the hardest time just getting basic health
coverage for, like he's, we gotin a car X or something.
Because I was always at ahealth murmur, our heart murmur,
and I was saying, well, can'twe like have a writer and the
policy saying if it's heartrelated it's not covered, but
just basic catastrophic?
And they wouldn't do it.
And I think partly it wasbecause they thought if
something were to happen thisguy would go before a jury and

(51:43):
say my poor little boy had aheart problem and a big bad
insurance company didn't coverit and so like they wouldn't be.
So I'm just saying some of thatstuff.
I think too.
Just the legal system the wayit is, and you know everyone's
afraid of being sued forabsolutely anything.
Yeah.
So I think that's partly whyyou can't just get real bare
bones, catastrophic coverage andnow it's literally illegal.

Speaker 1 (52:04):
Right, even before Even before.

Speaker 2 (52:06):
Yeah, because of things like that.
So that's so.
I'm just giving you someexamples to try to explain.
You know, why is it that we'rein this weird you know situation
now where health insuranceseems to be so distorted,
relative even to other forms ofinsurance?

Speaker 1 (52:20):
Yeah, yeah, just quickly to wrap up.
Final question we have a visionof what needs to happen.
We need to get governmentcoercion, get government out of
healthcare.
Can that happen through thepolitical system?
Can a politician do that?

Speaker 2 (52:42):
I mean in terms of like, is it theoretically
possible?
Yes, like Andrew Jacksonfamously got rid of the second
bank of the United States, youknow, which was like the Fed of
his day.
So, certainly, you know,airlines used to be heavily
regulated in the 1970s, and thenthere was deregulation.
So, even though, aslibertarians, we like to joke

(53:04):
and say, hey, there's no such,you know, there's nothing that
lives longer than a temporarygovernment program, stuff like
that that you know, yes, thereare just historical president,
it is possible to roll back thestate in certain areas.
I do think, though, it's reallydifficult because, again, even
if any single politician reallydoes have the right vision or
whatever, typically the way thesystem works, they're gonna have

(53:26):
to work with others, and it'shard to, you know, really get
that to go through.
So I think what I try to do, atleast, is to sketch a vision
and to show you know, this iswhat a good system would look
like, a free society.
This is how it would work, andso keep in mind, yes, these
government interventions overthe years are what's causing the

(53:48):
problem.
So people know what the heckhappened, but in terms of, you
know where I personally wouldput my efforts in trying to fix
things, is developingalternatives where people can
kind of opt out of the currentsystem.
So, like you know, in monetaryarena, rather than trying to
abolish the Fed even though thatwould be a good thing it's more
, you know, telling people aboutBitcoin and other things and

(54:11):
other you know, financialvehicles you can use, blah, blah
, blah, blah, that sort of thing.
And instead of attacking thetaxing account, you know
monopoly directly by getting ridof the medallion system, just
having Uber and Lyft comethrough, and then, you know, the
public will just gradually goaway.
And you know the post officestill has a monopoly on first
class letter delivery, butyou've got FedEx and UPS and you

(54:34):
know.
So that's kind of what I think.
So, just on the margins of me,if they could just more
liberalize.
So I think what's gonna happenmaybe this way to wrap up for me
is, rather than just thegovernment totally shutting down
the existing, you know, systemsthat are totally dependent on
the government's existence,instead just on the margins,
freeing up and liberalizing, sothat allowing people to, you

(54:57):
know, do these things on theside, to give an opt out option
for people.
To me that's what's gonna givethe most freedom, in the short
run at least, and also to thento provide an example so the
public can see wait a minutethese, you know, that's why I
like the Keith Smith example somuch.
They he's showing this, isn't?
You?
Gotta go read Rothbard and wecan imagine a tropical island

(55:19):
where there's free healthcare.
You know, free markethealthcare, not the.

Speaker 1 (55:22):
Right, but no, it's fear and it's.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
So, yeah, I think that's what it'd be.
So, politicians, maybe you knowto be able to, I think what's
realistic is they couldliberalize certain things and
allow competition.
Like I said, instead ofabolishing the FDA, just maybe
saying, oh, within certainclasses of things, you know, if
your doctor approved, you canget a prescription that's not
FDA approved.

(55:45):
You know what I mean.
That's not total laissez-faireanarchy, but it's better than
you know the current system kindof thing.
And then, once that's in place,people could check that out
after five years and become.
The rate of death in thatpopulation is no higher than the
general population.
So maybe this isn't such acrazy.
You know that kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (56:04):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, thank you so much.
This has been great.
Yeah, thank you.

Speaker 2 (56:11):
All right, thank you.
Keep up the good work ofgetting all this message out to
people.

Speaker 1 (56:15):
Yeah, you've been listening to.
What, then, must we Do?
The podcast.
For those who understand thestate is the problem and are
seeking solutions For moreepisodes, go to
bretanysubstackcom, that'sB-R-E-T-I-G-N-E.

(56:37):
Dot substack dot com andsubscribe.