Each poster calling for the Catholic hospitals to divorce themselves from federal dollars is reacting with the first seemingly obvious and logical option. However, the creeping influence of government dollars has attained a breadth that is so great that it is extremely difficult to operate at all. This is the case with public schools that have been roped into programs over decades that now leave them irreversibly dependent on those government program dollars to operate. Universities are in the same situation as research and student loan programs are essential to keeping student populations at a sustaining level.
Hospitals face even more regulatory pressures than universities and with the increased taxation of wage earners, there will be fewer non-government dollars available to sustain operations. Let’s not forget that donations from high wage citizens help institutions and those dollars are going to be taken by the government. Also, any hospital independent of government dollars will be serving a shrinking population of people with the after-tax dollars to pay the fees.
The only institutions that can operate independent of government dollars are generally very small and often poor. Large Catholic hospitals that are financially healthy will be few if they stop taking government money.
This of course, assumes that the government has endless amounts of money to spend. This great illusion is on its last legs. It is no longer possible to continue.
For example, Social Security alone is theoretically promised something on the order of $65T. In the wildest fantasies, does anything truly believe that it can be given that amount of money, unless the dollar is as degraded as the Zimbabwe dollar?
What this means, practically speaking, is that Social Security is over. It cannot continue. Even if all the children clap their hands, Tinkerbell will die.
The same applies to the other government “largesse magnifique”, Medicare and Medicaid. They are done, and all that awaits is their autopsy.
Higher education? No more student grants or loans. No billion dollar subsidies. Enormous State University reduced in size by 4/5ths.
This experimental, fantasy economy of endless, ever growing debt has only existed since WWII. It was fun while it lasted, but it built a castle in the sky. Fast or slow, the castle has to return to Earth.