> consumers are constantly faced with a choice of "buy food" or "starve to death".
And funnily enough, food is heavily government-subsidized and regulated. It's not really a free market either.
Also starving to death isn't really the same level of urgency as dying of a heart attack. There's a couple orders of magnitudes difference in the amount of time available to make a purchase decision, and the level of physical and mental stress you're under while making that decision.
> And funnily enough, food is heavily government-subsidized and regulated. It's not really a free market either.
Sure, but by this metric, there exists no free market on the planet. If your argument is that the healthcare market should look exactly like the food market does today (with subsidies and FDA regulations), most adherents of private healthcare would agree with you.
Privatization != "no welfare".
> Also starving to death isn't really the same level of urgency as dying of a heart attack. There's a couple orders of magnitudes difference in the amount of time available to make a purchase decision, and the level of physical and mental stress you're under while making that decision.
Okay, but not all healthcare is "dying of a heart attack". Obviously it's impossible to shop around for healthcare when you're having a heart attack, and that's exactly what insurance is for. After EMTALA, emergency care is free if you can't pay for it. This isn't really controversial. What's controversial is whether the same framework needs to be applied for planned care, like MRIs, colonoscopies, annual physicals, tonsillectomies, vaccines, prescription drugs, etc.
And funnily enough, food is heavily government-subsidized and regulated. It's not really a free market either.
Also starving to death isn't really the same level of urgency as dying of a heart attack. There's a couple orders of magnitudes difference in the amount of time available to make a purchase decision, and the level of physical and mental stress you're under while making that decision.