The July/August 2009 issue of Technology Review is especially good. In it there are articles on Wolfram Alpha, cap and trade, Obama’s technology stimulus, and nuclear fusion. It also contains an entire section on cloud computing and a thought-provoking essay on privacy in the age of Facebook.

A Pound of Cure (subscription required)
Andy Kessler, Technology Review, July/August 2009, pg. 75

The health-care industry’s reluctance to digitize its records is rooted in a desire to keep medicine’s lucrative business model hidden. Dangling $19 billion in front of a $2.4 trillion industry is not nearly enough to get it to reveal the financial secrets that electronic health records are likely to uncover–and upon which its huge profits depend. In those medical records lie the ugly truth about the business of medicine: sickness is profitable. The greater the number of treatments, procedures, and hospital stays, the larger the profit. There is little incentive for doctors and hospitals to identify or reduce wasteful spending in medicine.

According to a 2003 article by Dr. Steffie Woolhandler in the New England Journal of Medicine, administration accounts for 31 percent of expenses in the U.S. health-care industry, or more than $500 billion per year. (To put that in perspective, Google has spent well under 10 percent of that on all its R&D.)

I always laugh when people argue that a government health care system would be inefficient. I think they must never have visited a doctor’s office or dealt with their own health insurance company.

government · health · health care · insurance · policy · technology review · united states · usa

Why We Must Ration Health Care
Peter Singer, NY Times, July 15, 2009

I was first introduced to Peter Singer when I read his thought-provoking book, Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Our Traditional Ethics.

In this New York Times Magazine essay, Singer persuasively argues that we should make health care decisions based on the economics of treatment. This should be obvious, but many feel that it is immoral to place a dollar value on human life. That absurdity is untenable.

What do you think of formulas that attempt to place a dollar value on an individual? How much are you worth?

We need a health care rationing system that is economical.

The essay should be read in its entirety. Here are a few of my favorite excerpts.

Remember the joke about the man who asks a woman if she would have sex with him for a million dollars? She reflects for a few moments and then answers that she would. “So,” he says, “would you have sex with me for $50?” Indignantly, she exclaims, “What kind of a woman do you think I am?” He replies: “We’ve already established that. Now we’re just haggling about the price.”

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death · ethics · health care · life · peter singer · policy · singer · united states · usa

The road not taken
The Economist, March 21, 2009, pg31

I recently wrote about home ownership and how the recession has the power to change America’s landscape. These changes should be encouraged and accelerated.

Recession and Geography
Brent Danley, The Rhetoric, February 22, 2009

The essay I read today in The Economist magazine only strengthened my opinions about both home ownership and health care. Both issues are devastating our economy and weakening our chances to grow and lead.

“Mobility is part of the American dream”, the author writes. And I agree. People should move to where the work is and where they will be able to find employment that will best utilize their talents and skills. Unfortunately, policies of past administrators have succeeded in promoting home ownership as the new American Dream. The consequences of this short-sighted idealism should be obvious to even the casual observer.

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america · economy · government · health care · home ownership · insurance · mobility · policy · united states · worker