cannedjam

In the middle of a health care debate, what we are seeing is the attempted wholesale abandonment of the free market system that has propelled the United States to the forefront of innovation.

Through years of research, experimentation, and tremendous amounts of risk taking the American drug industry has emerged as the world leader. Everyone is told that if you work hard enough you will be rewarded, but what they fail to tell you is that if you succeed in creating something that is vital, it will be taken from you, and those who should be praising your innovation will turn on you when they feel entailed to your product.

The Obama administration is seeking to further limit the amount of time drug companies can hold onto their patents before cheaper generics can be manufactured. Sure, if you pay out of pocket for a drug that is $5 a pill, wouldn’t it be great if someone else could make it and sell it to you for 50¢ a pill? Never mind the $5 goes toward recouping the billions of dollars worth of research and development costs, the billions of dollars in current R&D costs for future drugs, and establishes a financial incentive for people to invest in emerging pharmaceuticals. Never mind that limiting the reward for the risks of developing drugs, limits the incentive to create new drugs, never mind that, no, let’s focus on the fact that there is a pill that will let you keep shoving doughnuts in your pie-hole while keeping your cholesterol down - and it’s too expensive for you to afford.

I guess the free market is good enough to foster the development of breakthroughs, but evil once it comes time to cash in on them. We would never be where we are if not for the profit motive, but now that we have arrived, let’s turn our back on it. Sounds good to me, seeing that we have already cured every disease that has ever and will ever exist. Pack it in boys, let’s start handing this stuff out. Job well done.

Okay, okay, I know what some of you are thinking, “wow this guy is an ass, I can’t believe he is sticking up for the drug companies who have us all by the short hairs”. Well, believe it, I believe unless you can do it yourself, you are at the mercy of those who can. I paid $3000 to have my apartment rewired because I don’t have the skill to do that myself. So unless you have some centrifuges, mass spectrometers, and electrophoresis gel hanging around your living room, and the knowledge, time and skill to develop your own medications, then I guess you will just have to pay for it.

I fail to realize how just because a product is for your health, it is not expected that you to have to pay for it, or those who sell it are demonized because they make money. I don’t know about you, but I am pretty happy lock smiths make money, because the one time I needed one he was still in business, and I was willing to pay him pretty much whatever it took to get in my house. When the cable company refused to give me the cable package for what I was willing to pay them, I said, “I understand your position, but understand mine, I am not willing to pay this and I am willing to go without cable if this is what it will cost”, they called me back and gave it to me for what I was asking - this is how a price is established. If I was going to die, and someone invented a pill to keep me alive, I would pay whatever it cost and chock the rest of my life up to bonus time. I for one am grateful that people make money by saving other people’s lives, because the alternative is a lot more costly.

JAM Economics, Politics Health Care, Obama