Originally posted by Jidoe
In addition, Adam Smith reckoned that healthcare and education are two things that benefit the society more than it benefits the private person. For example, one might feel healthcare is worth x$ a month for him, but for the entire society it's worth far more: income tax, labour, not infecting other people (that in itself is worth more than what it is worth for him). So each and every person feels wants to pay a certain amount of money for healthcare, but since for the country it's worth much more, it creates more resources to the country to actually subsidize the difference between what it is worth to the society and what it is worth to the private person, thereby increasing the societal surplus.
That's a good argument for a partial subsidy - that is, not socialised health care, nor complete "you get what you pay for" pure capitalism, but somewhere in between. For instance, a scheme like that could be implemented thus: doctors could be paid a retainer (from tax money) for their availability, and then they will be able to charge individual patients less. In return for the retainer, they could be required to accept certain patients (eg those with state pension cards - that means the elderly, but also certain other categories) at an even lower fee, which would then be well below market rates. This would mean that people still have to pay for a doctor's visit - and the fee could be high enough to discourage frivolous abuse - but it could be kept "affordable", whatever that means.

I still am not convinced this is the best way to do things, but it's something that would probably work.