> You're also making the assumption that rejuvenation tech
> won't be cheap enough for everyone at some point.
You're making an assumption that human life can be valued in terms of money.
Take any surgery for instance. They are all life extension technologies. If someone came to you and told you, if you don't pay us 100k you'll die within next 30 years from cancer, would you pay? If the price became 200k would you still pay? If the price became too large to pay, wouldn't you attempt to steal/beg for the money to not die? Some things are too valuable to haggle and you'll accept any price. This is why surgeries cost as much as they do in USA.
Stuff like this might be cheap or expensive depending on how it's bargained. Things like this are better left to be mandated by the government.
> Things like this are better left to be mandated by the government.
Only if you assume the government is somehow magically immune to the same problems of asymmetric power relationships that you describe. It isn't.
Also, earlier in your post you say:
> You're making an assumption that human life can be valued in terms of money.
Which is exactly what governments that are tasked with rationing health care have to do. They only have a finite amount of the taxpayers' money to spend, vs. a potentially infinite demand for health care.
> Only if you assume the government is somehow magically immune.
I didn't assume, but the fact is they are uniquely capable of solving this situation in optimal way for the ones acquiring such medicine/procedure. There are things they are bad at and things they are good at, this is the latter example.
A bad, corrupt government can do all kinds of really fucked up shit, so I don't even want to consider what a bad government might do in this case. E.g. treat a portion of people as literal cattle and feed others with it, murder the sick, etc.
> Which is exactly what governments that are tasked with rationing health care have to do.
Sorry, meant to say "You're making an assumption that you can value your life in terms of money". Your mother/father/employer might value your life in some way, but for you your life is usually precious.
Governments, can 'value life' in aggregate. Basically it comes down to bargaining power. If a doctor tricks your or cheats you on your bill, other than revenge and trying to sue them after they took your money away you aren't left with a lot of options (hell, you might even think treatments are supposed to be this expensive).
Governments on the other have more chips, bigger chips and stronger insurance when it comes to bargaining with the pharmaceutical and medical providers.
> I don't even want to consider what a bad government might do in this case
So you just magically assume that there are no bad governments? That doesn't seem very reasonable to me. Nor does your claim that this is something governments are somehow magically good at. They're not.
> for you your life is usually precious
If that were actually true, people would behave very differently than they do. Any behavior that, on average, reduces your life expectancy, is irrational under your assumption. And since most behaviors do that, your assumption leads to the conclusion that people should not do most of the things they in fact do.
> Basically it comes down to bargaining power.
If governments actually did nothing more than bargain for the best rates for any given treatment, on behalf of every citizen of the country, and then let each citizen choose (along with their doctor, of course) the best treatment they can afford, that would be fine. Even subsidizing some people to level the playing field for "what they can afford" to the extent possible would be fine. But no government limits itself to just doing that. Governments always end up rationing actual treatments. And they do it badly.
> So you just magically assume that there are no bad governments? That doesn't seem very reasonable to me. Nor does your claim that this is something governments are somehow magically good at. They're not.
No. I didn't say that. There are bad people in the world. And I walk down street all the time, not taking into consideration that every person I met today might attempt to murder me horrifically if they intended it.
Taking worse scenario in this case, isn't prudent. I'm talking how a government should behave and a lot of government, don't behave as you state. For example UK, Canadian and a lot of EU have socialized medicine and it works rather nice for them.
True, some probably had a fair share of mismanagement and probably some abuse. That doesn't detract from my point that it's possible to have decent government.
> If that were actually true, people would behave very differently than they do. Any behavior that, on average, reduces your life expectancy, is irrational under your assumption. And since most behaviors do that, your assumption leads to the conclusion that people should not do most of the things they in fact do.
You are constructing a strawman there. It won't work. I'm talking about immediate life altering changes.
Not some, you'll die if you smoked bacon. Or hot dogs. You need a heart in seven days or you are good as dead. You are given option:
A) pay X+30 amount of dollars and survive
B) go online, research the prices, try to find same procedure for amount X, then argue with current hospital to transfer to a new hospital, transport there taking large amount of risk and pay X dollars but a bigger chance that you'll die.
Usually, you'll go for option X+30 since it's less risky and those 30 bucks well, you can't spend them if you are dead anyway, right?
Next step X becomes X+30, repeat ad nauseam.
> UK, Canadian and a lot of EU have socialized medicine and it works rather nice for them
"Works rather nice" if you don't mind them rationing all forms of health care, which is precisely what I was referring to before: they don't just negotiate better rates for their citizens, they decide what health care those citizens are going to get. Which, as far as I can tell, results in longer wait times for various procedures and fewer people receiving them.
> it's possible to have decent government.
"Possible" is not the same as "likely enough to be worth betting on".
> I'm talking about immediate life altering changes.
And I'm pointing out that basing your reasoning solely on those emergency situations paints a false picture of how we actually value human life.
Sure, if a person is in a life-threatening emergency, they are willing to trade almost anything to stay alive. But they weren't thinking in those terms when they ate the smoked bacon or the hot dogs that ultimately led to the heart disease that put them in the position of needing a heart within seven days or dying. Why not? Because there was nothing in the system forcing them to actually take into account what it would cost to get a heart in seven days if it came to that.
Please note that I am not saying a "free market" in hearts, for example, would make the cost less than it is now. I am saying that nobody is forced to think of the cost at all until they are in the life-threatening situation. That's a bad system, and the government that allowed it to be put in place is bad government.
Please note also that the cost is not just monetary cost. There are fewer hearts (and kidneys, and livers, and other organs) available than there are people who need them, so decisions are going to have to be made about who gets them first. Every person who gets a heart because they failed to foresee the consequences of their bad eating habits or other lifestyle choices is taking that heart away from someone else, who might need it because they were in an accident, or for some other reason that's no fault of their own. Once the situation gets to that point, there are no good options; so the best thing we can do, to whatever extent possible, is to prevent those situations from ever happening. And that means forcing people to consider the long-term costs of their behaviors up front, while there's still time to do something about them before it becomes an emergency.
> Which, as far as I can tell, results in longer wait times for various procedures and fewer people receiving them.
Even in EU or in places with socialized medicine, you can decide to go to a private clinic. It's costly, but it's not like all doctors become state doctors or something. And from what I've read, whatever medicine they prescribe (assuming its regulated) will be lower costing, because the state bartered down the prices (procedures still cost a bundle).
> Why not? Because there was nothing in the system forcing them to actually take into account what it would cost to get a heart in seven days if it came to that.
Well, for once I'm not sure if there are definitive proof that sugar/salt/fat causes special problems and what interplay of them causes you to have heart/liver etc. problems.
However, we have all seen how states deal with something that causes great health cost like smoking -tax them and tax them good. I'm pretty sure that in Australia they managed to obliterate smoking, by replacing all brands with brownish packs with pictures of diseased lungs.
Another way could be subsidy for vegetables and other 'healthy' treats (salmon, tuna). But I don't see this being done by a non-state actor or a group. A state that has socialized medicine has most incentive to promote these programs, and a state only has enough means to put it into action.
> Even in EU or in places with socialized medicine, you can decide to go to a private clinic.
Sure, if you can afford it. But I thought the whole point of socialized medicine was to get people the health care they need regardless of whether they can afford it.
Listen, you can choose one of two options: a 'free' one you pay through your taxes or a private one you fund mostly on your dime. That said government doesn't prevent these things from happening. If you hate waiting and love to be pampered go for this option.
As for the longer wait times, sure, that happens. In fact it's supposed to happen, since MORE people can afford it (there is some abuse but I'd say it's minor).
If the price of waiting in line was $1000000 there would be no waiting in line, so I don't see much to your point. Low prices = more demand.
But low prices = less supply. And prices that the people actually getting the health care can't see = even more mismatch between demand and supply.
It's not just that people want more health care if the prices are lower; they want more health care that they shouldn't be getting, because they're not balancing the benefit to them against the actual cost; they're only balancing the benefit to them against the cost that they see. If they saw the full cost, they would not demand as much because they would realize that the resources they are demanding are not cheap.
In other words, the artificially low price of health care makes people think it's more abundant than it actually is, so they use up resources for minor problems that are then not available to address major ones; so many people are going to the doctor for colds and hangnails that people with serious illnesses aren't getting the care they need. The longer wait times are a symptom of that.
Also, since the prices are artificially controlled, there's less incentive for people to become doctors, nurses, and other health care workers; so there are fewer of them to go around, but more demand. Which further exacerbates the above problems. The longer wait times are a symptom of that too.
If someone came and told me I would die three years earlier than normal unless I paid 5M, I would say no. I disagree with your assertion that life is too valuable to put any number on. This is especially true in cases where treatment isn't a cure and it or paying for it severely decreases quality of life.
It might be expensive, but chances are it will be accessible to everyone. If rejuvenation tech can extend someone's working career, I would expect all sorts of loans would be available. You want to stay young and continue working for another 40 years? Well then of course we can front you $50k.
You're making an assumption that human life can be valued in terms of money.
Take any surgery for instance. They are all life extension technologies. If someone came to you and told you, if you don't pay us 100k you'll die within next 30 years from cancer, would you pay? If the price became 200k would you still pay? If the price became too large to pay, wouldn't you attempt to steal/beg for the money to not die? Some things are too valuable to haggle and you'll accept any price. This is why surgeries cost as much as they do in USA.
Stuff like this might be cheap or expensive depending on how it's bargained. Things like this are better left to be mandated by the government.