steven n fettig's Jitterin' Thoughts

    Believing that a centralist planning structure is better enabled at making decisions that are for the benefit of society assumes a lot of things about the central planning structure. It assume for one that the final decision is infallible (or at least a majority of the time). It also assumes that the structure has all of the pertinent information necessary for accurate decision making. There are indeed more guidelines for the perfect central planning structure, but these two seem to be the most obvious. I will try making two simple points:

  1) The only theoretical or real structure or being I know or have heard of being infallible is God. Whether or not you believe in God is not the point. We know humans are fallible. If this central planning structure is made up of humans, it will be fallible.
  2) The information needed to make decisions on behalf of individuals is not available to such a structure because it assumes that all of the life experiences of the individual for whom the decision is being made is at hand. This cannot be the case.

    While the two points above are very simplistic, it is intended to be ridiculously so. It is not possible (even in theory) for a central planning unit to make the best decisions for the humans whom these decisions impact. So, what does this have to do with socialism and my craze to understand why people support it? Take socialized medicine, for example. Everyone should have access to medicine suddenly became everyone has a right to unrestricted medical care. Because of people no longer being aware of the costs required to perform certain medical services, it naturally became normal for anything and everything to be provided without second thought to the cost and reasonableness of a service. The costs then began spiraling out of control and we ended up with the question: who is going to pay for all of this??? The natural answer is the government because the government has unlimited money resources and powers of control. Slowly we lead ourselves to the point where medicine is controlled and planned by a type of central planner. What happened to the patient being aware and responsible for the costs? It no longer existed. So now we are in a situation where either the cost of medicine will have to go down, which ultimately leads to reduced services and higher costs (you cannot change the demand without affecting the supply - as prices drop below market value, the number of providers will be reduced and therefore the ability for the market to keep up with demand will be reduced and hindered. We are also in a situation where someone who does not know me or my family (not necessarily so, but the likely situation) is in charge of making life and death decisions. How is this good for society? Has increased access to medical services brought society a greater good?
    You see, one of the assumptions made is that because people do not have health insurance (or shall we call it coverage) they will not have access to medical services. This is simply not the case. Look at the balance sheet of hospitals and health organizations alike - they are littered with write-offs due to uncollectible services performed. Services are accessible to even those who cannot afford it. The problem many people have is that there is a disparity between the health services offered to a given segment of society versus another. No matter the system you design, one group of the population will have easier access to medical services than the other, however. The reasons are not limited to money alone! (The false assumption many people make.) If you think logically about the problem, it would become apparent that limitations can and do include geographical locations. Do you think people in northern Saskatchewan receive the same level of service that those whom live in New York City? I am not going to answer the question - I will follow up with another: What would the reasons for this be? Email me if you don't understand.
    The solution to this problem is not more control. If you look at the two reasons why centralized planning will not and cannot work, it easily applies to health care. It is likely that wrong (and expensive - i.e. a waste of money and services) decisions will be made and that not all information pertinent to the decision will be available. The solution is giving the power back to the individual. Most people believe that because individuals often act in their own interest that it is bad for society as a whole. This assumption is misleading. It only accepts the idea that individuals making decisions in their best interest has a detrimental effect on society. What about individuals pursuing their own wants and desires automatically leads us to believe such action is bad? I think where most people falter is that they think their ideas and beliefs are right for everyone else and fail to see that people being "selfish" has a net positive effect on the efficiency and overall wealth (material and non-material - i.e. knowledge, progress & etc.) of any given group of people (or society in general).
    At first this concept may be counterintuitive, but think about this: what gives us the drive and determination to do things better, make life easier and advance our own personal situation? Knowing that my life can be better if I work hard and apply my knowledge and actions appropriately. Better carries two meanings - preferable and more fulfilling. When we talk about what would make society run more smoothly and remove the suffering (as Buddha puts it) from our lives, we ought not look at ways of placing more controls on how and what people do, we ought focus on means of reducing the overall burdens we place on each citizen by expanding their freedom to act and live as they please.
    The fear in this seems mostly to be that of anarchy. There is a enormous difference between socialism and anarchy, however. With this I am led abruptly back to my question of why people embrace the concept of socialism and the only answer I can conclude with is fear, indolence and a need to control what others do with their lives. Is this harsh? Absolutely. True? I guess that is for you to decide.

Oh... because my comments are not working correctly, I decided to include the following comment in the text:
The below comment by Michael is single-handedly the dumbest comment I have seen posted on my website. Religion is no more of an illusion than belief in a scientific theory. Theories are attempts at proving possibilities. Religion is (usually) a systematic belief in a way of life. If believing that your life should be this way or that way is illusional, I would love to see what you think it is that drives you to make decisions a certain way. If you think life is nothing more than biological habit and instinct, then I can understand why you would say the above. BUT, if that is what you believe life is, then it is no use arguing, because it would be senseless debate brought on by my instinct to defend my ideas - which are nothing more than instincts... Don't you enjoy circular reasoning?