Roger Ebert on the Gathering Storm

By Got Shares? - K_Yew | March 9, 2010, 12:01 pm

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Roger Ebert inspired by Thomas Friedman leads to an interesting post:

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2010/02/the_gathering_storm.html

Here is the comment I tried to post on Ebert's blog:

I am agog at how many people have shared their stories and opinions. As for me, I don't have much to say except this: no system will work, including universal or for-profit healthcare, unless people are ethical.

Today, in almost every profession, incentives tend to push people, even good ones, into poor decisions. For example, if you're a doctor who gets reimbursed based on the number of tests you order, why not order an extra one? Does this attitude change under universal healthcare? Of course not. The only difference is who pays for it.

Conservatives understand human nature's tendency to game systems and are afraid that universal healthcare represents a massive opportunity for dishonest people to game the system and pass the buck (literally :-) Liberals, on the other hand, see the poor man in the street dying from a treatable chronic disease, or the cancer patient who can't get treatment, and are outraged. They want things to change. Neither side seems to understand that the incentives in healthcare need to change in order to promote ethics and a sustainable system.

When I see people argue in broad terms, I see no opportunity for real agreement. I am reminded of Yates: "Turning and turning in the widening gyre..."
About Got Shares? - K_Yew

Bottom line about the way I think: we are born the same, but create patterns over time based on our lives that make an open mind less of a possibility. The key is to try to place yourself in different situations as much as possible to shock your system and force it to think differently; otherwise, the brain's natural course will be to calcify the patterns it picks up from limited local experience and the media, instead of reality.
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