An idea to reduce health care costs

Coming from a man who will begin law school next month, this might seem peculiar.

But logic applied to the law of supply and demand (which, by the way, is more binding than any statute or regulation that I'm aware of), dictates a simple step to reducing health care costs in America. State governments across the country could do it today, and it would begin improving the health care market in just a few years.

States could dramatically reduce tuition at public medical schools, and replace lost revenue by dramatically increasing tuition at public law schools.

It doesn't take a brain surgeon to realize America has too many lawyers. But it'd be hard to imagine a world with too many doctors. Likewise, nurses are in short supply, and their shortage also weighs on the lagging supply of medical care.

There are a variety of factors contributing to this market imbalance. Among them is the exorbitantly expensive malpractice insurance that doctors must carry to protect themselves against all the attorneys with too much time on their hands.

Another factor is the expense of medical school, especially compared to other professional schools. A cost-benefit analysis of law school vs. medical school would send all but those most-committed to medicine towards a law degree. At the University of Kansas, where I will enroll in August, law school tuition will be about $15,000 for the academic year. At the KU Medical Center, on the other hand, tuition is about $24,000 a year. Law school lasts three years, medical school lasts four.

So youthful Kansans intent on post-graduate education and a professional career see a bill of $45,000 over three years to become a lawyer. Then they see $96,000 over four years to become a doctor. Add, say, $60,000 in lost income for the fourth year, when the lawyer will practice and the doctor will pay tuition.

My brother (an engineer) and my sister (a math teacher) both far exceed my skills and enthusiasm at mathematics. But even I can add that one up.

We could have the libertarian discussion about whether or not social engineering is moral. (It is not.) But at the end of the day, it is not the goal of public universities to act as charity towards all men, so that each can pursue whatever whim might fancy him. It is the goal of public universities to provide the education for the new generation, in accordance with the needs of the taxpayers that are funding them.

At the moment, those taxpayers need more doctors than attorneys.