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Comment by eviks | Hacker News Reader

You're not a mechanic, how can you evaluate the services be certain that they didn't oil your breaks instead of your engine?

> can’t search for my preferred cardiologist when I’m having a heart attack.

You can't search for your preferred mechanics when your breaks failed on a highway.

Yet somehow that didn't kill the competitive marketplace.

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That’s a bad analogy. If my brakes fail, once I come to a stop there’s no urgency in getting them fixed. I can abandon the care if it’s a lemon. I can have it towed home. I can use Yelp to find a reasonable mechanic. I can rent another car until this one’s fixed. It’s the opposite of “every second counts”.

Meanwhile, this is the only heart I have, and if it’s in danger of stopping, I have approximately seconds to call 911 to get someone to come take me to the repair shop of their choosing.

It could be said that you’re over-generalizing here.

Arguing against any attempt at competitive healthcare pricing because medical emergencies exist is a bit throwing the baby out with the bath water.

I wasn’t arguing that. I was pointing out that this was a bad analogy.

I can call a cab or get a replacement car from my insurance to drive around in, and I understand my body a whole lot less than my car. Demand for a car mechanic is nowhere near as inelastic as most of healthcare, so I don’t think this analogy really fits. At most it suggests that private markets can handle ambulances as well as we handle roadside towing.

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