[AndyJackson]

The private enterprise argument is irrelevant here because there is no effective price competition in Obama managed health care.

Three conditions for a free market long known by economists:

• No monopoly
• No monopsony
• No information asymmetry.

  In the American healthcare system all three principles are violated in spades.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

Agreed. Most of those using the "private Property" argument are mixing up market and commodity models. In addition there is the legal doctrine which says; 'no man can use his property to harm others.' One can adjust the price via the patent procedure, subsidies etc.

Different principles apply to the sale of a product when lives hang in the balance.

[RainMan]

You are confusing terms. What you are describing is a "Perfect Market" or "Perfect Competition", which is almost the opposite of a free market.

to wit ...

a perfect market requires a large number of buyers and sellers ... but in a free market, you can have just one buyer and just one seller. (I.e, monopoly and monopsony can exist in a free market, but not in a perfect market)

a perfect market requires "perfect information" ... i.e, everyone knows exactly the same information about prices and costs. A free market allows information to be used as a lever for price. (i.e, free markets leverage information asymmetry.)

a perfect market has homogenous products. A free market has products that differ based on the needs and requirements of both manufacturers and customers.

in a perfect market, every participant is a price taker, and nobody has the market power to set prices. In a free market, you can charge what the market will bear.

in a perfect market, you have rational buyers and sellers. A free market makes no such requirement.

in a perfect market, you have no externalities (i.e, transactions do not affect 3rd parties). In a free market, externalities can be a reason for participating in a transaction.

in a perfect market, there are non-increasing economies of scale and no network effects. In a free market, you have both.



A perfect market is, in short, an economists fantasy. It is purely theoretical, and used as a benchmark to determine which levers are being pulled to move a market. A free market is (unfortunately) becoming more theoretical, as governments step in to try to impose perfect market conditions so that the government can choose winners and losers.

What the government is trying to do with Obamacare is create a "perfect market".