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Comment by gnu8 | Hacker News Reader

The Soviet healthcare system suffered from underinvestment due to their command economy's focus on heavy industry and military production. The problem in the United States is the exact opposite: unproductive overinvestment due to the proliferation of waste, fraud, rent-seekers, and all other types of interests that rake a profit off the top without contributing anything to patient care. It seems like a false argument to claim that because a radically socialist regime provided inferior care, our radically capitalist regime is not the cause of our inferior care.

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I believe pjlegato's point was that while idealism may attract many students into medicine, it's ultimately the profit motive that keeps them working 60+ hour weeks and taking call for decades.

I have a few physicians in my extended family and this mirrors what I've seen from them; I don't know how you'd get board certified neurosurgeons to take q3 trauma call in more rural areas for years on end other than ''here's a boatload of money''. It's masochistic work.

Capitalism, especially our current flavor of it, has plenty of problems, but I think it's important to separate the core principals (mostly free markets, pursuit of self interest) from the pollutants (loopholes, cronyism and special interests).

"our radically capitalist regime"

Citation required. I'd venture the US is more accurately described as a hybrid socialist / mercantilist regime than a capitalist regime.

The US seems more of a militaristic-mercantile regime when you consider the way the budget is allocated. Sure US has progressive taxes that are pretty high, but no single payer health care, outrageously priced education system, and few social safety nets - all indicate a low level of "social ownership over means of production" which is a defining characteristic of socialism.

The US health care system has not been a free market for 50 years, likely much longer. It's got very heavy government involvement at all levels.

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