Robin Hanson notoriously thinks that most medicine does little or no good. I’d guess that he opposes large-scale socialized medicine on these grounds, though that’s not a foregone conclusion and I don’t think I’ve seen an explicit statement from him about this. It’s probably more usual to think that medicine is great and we should all have easier access to more of it. How about a question somewhere in this vicinity?
There’s a few options that come to mind, none of them perfect. One basic one is to ask how much we should be spending on health care; the risk here is if you think there is counterfactual effective medical spending. Another is what we feel is the marginal cost to current medicine of an additional year of life or healthy life, which could also be compared to what people think that year or a life saved is worth. What percentage of the current investment in medicine has a substantial benefit to the patient? is a way to try and measure this directly rather than indirectly.
I’d guess that he opposes large-scale socialized medicine on these grounds, though that’s not a foregone conclusion and I don’t think I’ve seen an explicit statement from him about this.
I vaguely recall Robin noting that socialized medicine (as implemented in other countries) tends to reduce both supply of medical treatment and money spent on such, so I’d actually expect that he would weakly support it in the sense of “more optimal than the current system”. I could be wrong, though.
However, I’m pretty sure he feels that other options would be superior.
Robin Hanson notoriously thinks that most medicine does little or no good. I’d guess that he opposes large-scale socialized medicine on these grounds, though that’s not a foregone conclusion and I don’t think I’ve seen an explicit statement from him about this. It’s probably more usual to think that medicine is great and we should all have easier access to more of it. How about a question somewhere in this vicinity?
Yes, but how can we phrase this rigorously? “Medicine does little good” seems too open to interpretation.
There’s a few options that come to mind, none of them perfect. One basic one is to ask how much we should be spending on health care; the risk here is if you think there is counterfactual effective medical spending. Another is what we feel is the marginal cost to current medicine of an additional year of life or healthy life, which could also be compared to what people think that year or a life saved is worth. What percentage of the current investment in medicine has a substantial benefit to the patient? is a way to try and measure this directly rather than indirectly.
I vaguely recall Robin noting that socialized medicine (as implemented in other countries) tends to reduce both supply of medical treatment and money spent on such, so I’d actually expect that he would weakly support it in the sense of “more optimal than the current system”. I could be wrong, though.
However, I’m pretty sure he feels that other options would be superior.