As a nation, we need to re-examine our attitude toward the whole area of entitlements: “free” health care, “free” access to reproductive health choices, “free” medications, “free” this and “free” that.
The fact is that nothing is free. Even the air we breathe, the air we want clean and contaminant-free, is not costless.
Scrubbers on power plant smokestacks and automotive catalytic converters cost money. Anyone who buys electricity or a car pays something extra for the cleaner air that results from the scrubber or converter.
So, when we hear of “free” contraceptives, or “free” access to reproductive care, or “free” anything, we’re either listening to a politician or else someone who knows absolutely nothing about economics and how the real world works. (Sometimes it’s one and the same person.)
Whenever people perceive that something is costless, they may tend to abuse or mistreat it.
Anyone with too many items will tend to treat them carelessly if they were acquired with the blood, sweat, toil and tears of someone else.
The same case can be made for the rights and liberties that we enjoy as Americans. Those who have served their country tend to view its freedoms differently than those who haven’t. The entitlement mentality can extend to intangibles as well.
The concept of “free” leads to two subsequent ideas, both bastard children of the entitlement mentality.
The first is the “buy now, pay or worry about it later” mentality; the second is the seductive idea of “fairness.”
The idea of deferring payment for present enjoyment is widespread and it ignores the fundamental relationship between actions and consequences. The “buy now, pay later” paradigm obscures the Law of Shortages: there is always too little money or time or human energy.
Any deferred cost always carries some form in interest, be it tangible or intangible.
The concept of “fairness” is quite often invoked by the whiners who wonder why everyone doesn’t get everything desired. Quite often the simple answer is that the desired object wasn’t paid for. It’s not free.
We’d all like a “fair” world, where no one is hurt, the bad guys go to jail, all college graduates find satisfying and rewarding work and pay off their student loans early, and we all live happily ever after.
But it doesn’t work that way, no matter what the politicians, media, academics or other members of the chattering classes may say.
Examples abound. Medicare fraud is rampant, and why not? Given the government’s inability to prudently control spending, coupled with the widespread idea that Medicare is “free” (after all, everyone feels as though they’ve somehow “earned” it), it’s no wonder that the program has become a cash cow for fraudsters.
People of all ages are questioning the solvency and longevity of Social Security, and with good reason. Many forget that one of the underlying assumptions of the program has always been an ever-expanding population to pay for the benefits.
The notion of Social Security as an entitlement is widespread, as is the notion of “free” birth control for women.
Few understand the connection between our declining birth rate and Social Security’s long-term future.
There is a definite connection between birth control, and Social Security’s long-term problems.
The current position of the Obama administration on mandatory coverage of contraceptives perfectly illustrates the lack of appreciation about the behavior of costs.
Religious groups who object to contraceptive coverage will not be required to provide it through their group insurance.
Rather, women under such plans will be provided the medications directly from the insurance companies at no cost to them.
This displays a profound lack of economic awareness. Drug manufacturers will not be providing these pills for free.
The question remains: who pays, if not the recipient? The obvious answer: everyone covered under the plan. This returns us to the original controversy.
If you can’t identify the specific source of the funding, then look in the mirror and check your wallet.
You’ve found the payer.
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