A few days after telling the American Medical Association that he was not a socialist, Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jon Leibowitz went right back to implementing health care socialism. On Friday, the FTC announced its 36th “consent order” since 2001 against a physician group for the crime of negotiating a contract without FTC consent. The only wrinkle in this case is the physician group is located in Minnesota, where the state legislature recently enacted a law giving the state power to review and approve “jointly negotiated” contracts; the FTC, however, decided that law didn’t apply here — the second instance this week of the unelected FTC claiming the right to make binding interpretations of laws enacted by elected state legislatures.
I won’t re-travel old ground here on the physician issue. But two things to keep in mind. First, if physician price-fixing is indeed as rampant as the FTC has claimed over the past decade, then the antitrust system has not done its job. There is no other industry I am aware of where there were 36 cases of price-fixing — 38 counting two Justice Department civil cases — without any criminal prosecution. The FTC has said time and again doctors who jointly negotiate contracts — or refuse to accept federal or state price controls — are guilty of price-fixing. Price-fixing is a felony.
The DOJ generally prosecutes price-fixing as a criminal matter. Why are the doctors getting a break? By my count, over 19,000 individual physicians were members of the 38 groups charged with civil antitrust violations. If the FTC and DOJ really believe their own antitrust rhetoric, then they have a legal obligation to indict, prosecute, and imprison physicians who fix prices. The DOJ prosecutes small businessmen and individual employees all the time, so that can’t be the reason physicians are held to a different antitrust standard.
The real reason, of course, is that imprisoning physicians would set off a political firestorm that would focus public and political attention on the DOJ, and by extension the FTC. News footage of FBI agents “raiding” physician offices — remember, antitrust “raids” are common in Europe — with trusted family doctors led away in handcuffs while a federal prosecutor tells the public how multi-billion dollar insurance companies are “victims” of a price-fixing conspiracy wouldn’t sit well with most people. It would look like the government is using the threat of prosecution to coerce economic outcomes. Which of course is what’s going on now.
The second thing to keep in mind is that while you might cheer the FTC and DOJ’s tough stance against doctors — thinking it might somehow magically lower your own medical costs — the agencies may turn against you next. As Chairman Leibowitz told the AMA, he’s a strong supporter of the Obamacare bill — which includes that pesky health insurance mandate. Some would call that a grant of monopoly privilege, forcing customers to buy your product. Jon Leibowitz calls it market competition. And once the mandate takes effect, suppose a group of activists publicly gather and say they won’t comply and refuse to buy health insurance.
Well, gee, the FTC might just call that price-fixing. After all, if doctors refuse to sign a contract with state-backed insurers, that’s illegal; so why would it be legal for people to collectively refuse to purchase a mandatory service? Certainly if there were any organized groups that advocated defiance of the mandate, it would be acceptable for the FTC to investigate, prosecute, and compel such groups to never oppose the government’s healthcare mandates again. Because that’s the rule already applied to doctors.
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should I be a doctor or a lawyer when I grow up?
To know what job you want in the future, look at the composition of the people in congress and what jobs they used to have, and take the one most of them have.
Right now that’s lawyer. There are a few doctors there too but lawyers are the biggest group in Congress.
It makes sense that Congress makes incomprehensible 2000+ page bills when you consider that this contributes directly to lawyers by making them a necessity.
Interesting fact is that Ron Paul is himself a doctor rather than a lawyer.
Paul has also sponsored legislation to end the FTC’s war on physicians. Sadly, the FTC continues to enjoy wide “bipartisan” support in Congress.
When a country has many thousands of pages of criminal laws in its books then every person in the country is a criminal. The point is not to put everyone in the slammer, but to always have something that could be used against anybody who they think needs to be taken down. Look at major league baseball – they have been declared in violation of anti-trust law but were “given” an exemption, which is then used to threaten the owners and players whenever the government wants to go gorilla on them and beat them over the head with things like doping inquiries.
It is analogous to the typical anti-libertarian argument: “Oh yeah, well you drive on highways so I guess you think the government is OK after all.” The government legal code, like the highway system, is a tangle of barbed wire wrapped around every person in society. “If it wasn’t for the government you wouldn’t have laws-roads-schools-internet-inventions-music-books-jobs-retirement-medicine.”
I would note that the baseball exemption was the product of a Supreme Court decision. Congress later limited and codified the exemption.
Besides, it’s already been declared that the government and now-nationalized insurance companies have the right to price-fixing! Who do those physicians think they are?
Obama is intent on making this great Republic, a Union of Socialists Republic. God help us and let’s remember November.
Can anyone respond to this article below? I am studyiing Auatrian economics and am currently analysing socialism, which i am against obviously. This article makes Venezuela look better than it is. Thanks.
VENEZUELA: ACHIEVEMENTS OF 10 YEARS OF REVOLUTION
Submitted by admin on Mon, 02/23/2009 – 00:12 During 10 years of revolution, the Bolivarian Government has been breaking free from paradigms, beating obstacles, exceeding all expectations, facing empires, revolutionizing consciousness, beating foreign and internal propaganda, and even more, defending, as the engine and fuel of the revolutionary project, the deep conviction that the human being is the center and principle of the society.
The most representative achievements can be evaluated quantitatively through the Missions, infrastructure works and technological advancements, among others, but the qualitative analysis leads us to three big conclusions: with the arrival of the Bolivarian Revolution, the quality of life has been boosted for most Venezuelans, social inequalities have been reduced significantly and Venezuela has made important steps in the struggle to reach the real conditions of a developed country.
ACHIEVEMENTS
1. REDUCTION OF POVERTY
During the administration of the Bolivarian Government led by President Hugo Chávez, the extreme poverty rate significantly fell from 42% in 1998 to 9.5%. This result allowed Venezuela to achieve in advance this UN Millennium Goal. General poverty was also significantly reduced, from 50.5% in 1998 to 33.4% in 2008.
Venezuela’s Human Development Index also increased from a 0.69 (medium development) in 1998 to 0.84 (high development) in 2008. Currently, Venezuela ranks 67 out of 179 countries according to the 2008 UNDP report.
Venezuela’s Gini coefficient fell to 0.4099, the lowest in the country’s history and in Latin America. In 1998 it was 0.4865.
2. ACCESS TO EDUCATION
In 2005, Venezuela achieved the goal set by UNESCO to declare a country an illiteracy-free territory; 96% of adults and elders know how to read and write. But we are still working and 99.6% of the population over the age of 15 is now literate.
Currently, the Venezuelan state spends 7% of the GDP on education, compared to 3.9% of Venezuela’s GDP in 1998. Without including the socialist missions (social programs), school enrolment was 6.2 million students in 1998; now it is 7.5 million students both in public and private schools.
The socialist missions, created as an initiative of President Chávez to look after the population excluded from the formal educative system, show the following statistics:
a. Mission Robinson II: 437,171 students, including 81,000 indigenous students, have graduated.
b. Mission Ribas: 510,585 students have graduated.
c. Mission Sucre: 571,917 Venezuelans are in the higher education system in 24 programs (career), in 334 different municipalities. 30,000 students have graduated from seven programs: education, environmental management, social management of local development, journalism, management, computer science, and agro-food production.
3. ACCESS TO HEALTH
Venezuela invests 4.2% of its GDP in health and it continues deepening strategies to guarantee Venezuelans free access to health with the creation of the social programs Barrio Adentro I-II-III and IV. Up to 2009, Barrio Adentro has made the following achievements:
a. 24,884,567 Venezuelans, that is to say 88.9% of the population, benefit from this mission.
b. 630,491 Venezuelan lives have been saved thanks to this mission.
c. Barrio Adentro has inaugurated: 6,531 popular health centers, 479 Integral Diagnosis Centers, 543 Integral Rehabilitation Centers, 26 High Technology Centers, 13 popular clinics, 459 popular opticians and 3019 locations offering medical and dental care.
The public health policies developed by the Bolivarian Government have managed to reduce the children mortality rate (children under 5 years) to 13.7%. In 1990 this figure was 25.8%.
4. SOCIAL SECURITY
Unemployment has been reduced by 50% during President Chávez’s administration, falling from 12% to 6.1% by early 2009.
In May 2007, the Venezuelan minimum wage became the highest in Latin America (US$372). In addition, workers receive a monthly bonus for food amounting to over US$139. Also, pensions have been increased to the minimum wage.
5. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
The Venezuelan economy has experienced 20 consecutive quarters of growth. The year 2004 stands out with an historical growth of 18.3%. The 2008 rate of growth was 4.9%. Our economy has grown by 526.98% compared to the Venezuelan economy in 1998.
Venezuela has the fourth largest economy in Latin America after Brazil, Mexico and Argentina.
6. FOOD SOVEREIGNTY
In order to guarantee the country’s food security and sovereignty, the Bolivarian Government created Mission Food, whose aim is to offer basic foodstuffs to the Venezuelan population at low prices and without intermediaries. This initiative materialized with the creation of a network of storing centers and stores (Mercal, PDVAL, ASA, FUNDAPROAL, and silos, among others).
In 1998, Venezuela produced 16,272,000 tons of vegetables. By 2008, Venezuela managed to produce 20,174,000 tons of food. This represents a 24% increase.
7. PUBLIC DEBT
The public debt dropped from 73.5% of the GDP in 1998 to 14.4% in 2008, placing the national deficit as one of the lowest in the World.
In 1998, a debt of $3 billion was paid off to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and to the World Bank (WB).
8. INTERNATIONAL RESERVES
By early 1999, the International Reserves amounted to US$14.3 billion. In January 2009, they amount to US$41.9 billion.
9. TECHNOLOGY SOVEREIGNTY
Before the Bolivarian government, there was practically no investment in science and technology. Today, 2.69% of Venezuela’s GDP is aimed at science and technology.
With the creation of the Infocentros (centres of information) and the National Technological Literacy Plan, the access of the population to information and communication technologies was boosted.
On October 29, 2008, Venezuela launched the Simón Bolívar Satellite from the Sichuan’s Satellite Center in the People’s Republic of China. It is operative and the Venezuelan state has taken control. Satellite services will be offered to thousands of communities all around Venezuela, and beyond our borders in other Latin American and Caribbean countries, with tele-education and telemedicine programs.
The consolidation of Venezuela’s technological sovereignty also includes the nationalization of the main, strategic, telephone company, Venezuela’s National Company of Telephones (CANTV, Spanish acronym).
10. ELIMINATION OF GENDER INEQUALITY
Gender equality adds to the achievements of the Venezuelan society. Women’s participation in Communal Centers is 60%; 4 out of the 5 Public Powers are headed by women. The women’s presence in the National Assembly (Venezuelan parliament) increased from 10% to 16.5%.
[Ministry of People's Power for Communication and Information. January 30, 2009.]
I agree with the comment made by Henry. We live in the greatest country on earth period. We also live
in a country that has a collection of individuals, therefore it’s about giving people the tools or at least some tools, and not doing it for them like many (liberals) enjoy seeing.
Sure our health care system needs reconstructive surgery in various areas, however it does not need to be dismantled like this admin is trying to do.
Regards,
Jeff
I just wish politicians would stop meddling. They’re always causing the mess then they tell us that they’re the only ones that can fix it. I’m just sick and tired of these career politicians and their half truths. If you listen to a politician talk you’ll swear that you need a lawyer in the room. America is a great country and she will survive this.
“America is a great country and she will survive this.”
Sometimes I’m not so sure, about the greatness or whether America will survive. When I ask myself how things could have gotten so bad with politicians, I always end up thinking of H.L. Mencken’s quote “Democracy is when the people get the government they deserve; good and hard.” In other words, the politicians continue to meddle because the people who put them in office want them to meddle, and they will be removed from office if they don’t continue meddling. Politicians don’t get in office, or get removed from office, by magic. They are voted in or out by the American people. The American people seem to have lost whatever moral fibre they once had. If the American people don’t get their shit together and stop thinking only of mitigating their short-term pain, instead of doing what is morally right, things will only get worse. To dredge up another old quote: “I have met the enemy and he is us.”
If the American people continue to be their own worst enemies, I think we may not survive. I’m not a huge Ayn Rand fan, but right now, I think we are seeing the real-world equivalent of “Atlas Shrugged”. The people who make this country run, the businessmen, bankers, etc., seem to be taking a wait and see attitude towards any new investments. Some, of course, are even downsizing their enterprises. They are doing this because of the incredible instability they perceive in the current politico-economic environment. And I can’t really bring myself to blame them. Big business gets blamed for all the bad things that happen economically anyway, so what do they have to lose?
I dread the thought that Democratic pull through this next election. If we have two more years of Obama and a Democratic Congress, we are just plain fucked. We may not come out of this for another 10 to 20 years, if ever. After all, look at us in the Great Depression. Assuming that the Keynesians are right and the war brought us out of it, it took from 1929 to 1942/3? That’s 13 or 14 years. Assuming that we didn’t get out of the Depression until well after the war was over, that’s more like 20 years. It could happen again.
I also dread that the RINO faction of the Republican party takes the election. If that happens, we are still fucked, except maybe with a little Vaseline and a reach-around. Not only will the ecomony be pretty much the same as under the Obamacrats, but it will give the Obama zombies more fodder for blaming free enterprise for the disaster.
(rant mode off)
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