The market for healthcare!

Policies for healthcare in the US present a huge debate for the passionate and a a dilemma for the policy-makers. If you do not know much about the issue, here is the Economist's appetiser Desperate Measures for you.

This line captures the theme of the article.

The first question is whether to try to make America's imperfect market work better, or to accept that markets cannot work in health care and focus more on government regulation. The second is whether to go for incremental reform or a comprehensive overhaul.

The policy problems are galore: equality; targetting the needy; government funding etc, but there are market design problems as well, regarding information for the companies and the consumers; cost-cutting incentives; high liability damages and supply-side regulations which don't find much mention in the article. But more on it later. With a few academic issues to sort out, my blog-posts will have less intensity for the next few days.