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Bankrupcy and Health Care

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As a follow-up on Scott’s excellent post below, see this new blog-within-a-blog at TPM. Pretty cool, for those of us who like to rubberneck at this slow-motion train-wreck. The blog is written by a Harvard Law professor with some expertise in this area, Elizabeth Warren, and several law students.

It’s pretty much pointless to argue with those who casually rely on libertarian rhetorical strategies in place of argument on this issue. The dishonest and highly risky loan strategies of credit card companies aside, I can’t help but be struck by the ways in which catastrophic health care costs, increasingly poorly covered by many health plans, including my own (for some examples, see thisĀ post). A brain tumor or some such thing would almost certainly send send me toward bankrupcy, and frankly, I’m not sure there’s anything I could do about it. But even if I could–if there was some sort of costly supplemental insurance I could purchase, is it really desirable that I do so? Wouldn’t the economy benefit a great deal more from more traditional forms of spending in more labor-intensive industries? We’ve managed to structure health care costs and coverage in such a way that a significant chunk of the population is a little bad luck and a serious health problem away from bankrupcy, and most of them don’t know it.

Here I go again, arguing in good faith about a bill that has nothing to do with it. Why on earth should we take arguments for such a bill seriously if they won’t eliminate the millionaireĀ homestead exemption?

Back in the hopeful, naive pre-Nov. 2, 2004 world, when we were allowed to have fantasies about sensible policy initiatives, I seem to remember an elite, out of touch Senator from some decadent coastal enclave or another proposing some sort of health-care scheme that would take steps toward a national solution to catastrophic health care expenses. Now that’s the kind of bankrupcy reform I can get behind. Of course, that didn’t work out, so now that same Senator is forced to reform bankrupcy by promoting the legalization of usury. Oh well, whatever works.

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