Medicare Meets Mephistopheles

By David A. Hyman

Book Overview

Let's say you're the devil, and you want to corrupt the American republic. How would you go about it? According to David Hyman, you might create something like Medicare, the federal health care program for the elderly. Hyman submits that Medicare may be the greatest trick the devil ever played. Medicare feeds on the avarice of doctors and other providers, turns seniors into health care gluttons, and makes regions of the United States green with envy over the dollars showered on other regions. The program exploits the sloth of government officials to increase the tax burden on workers and drag down the quality of care for seniors. Medicare makes Democrats lust for socialized medicine, while its imperviousness to reform makes Republicans angrier and angrier. Most of all, Medicare allows its ideological supporters to bleat and preen their way to the heights of moral vanity. In the style of C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, Hyman writes that Medicare has freed the self-interest of these mortals from its natural restraints. As a result, the seven deadly sins have blossomed. With epic political battles over Medicare and the future of limited government looming just over the horizon, Hyman uses satire to cast a critical eye on this mediocre government program.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1930865902
• ISBN13: 9781930865907
• Release Date: August 2006
• Publisher: Cato Institute
• Length: 138 Pages
• Weight: 0.85 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.3" x 9.4"

Customer Reviews

Concise, witty, readable Satanic endorsement of Medicare

This relatively short book is in the form of a long memo from an underling demon to Satan, complementing him on the great success of his plan to use Medicare to destroy the American Republic. After giving a brief history of Medicare, he examines the program from the perspective of how it works with the seven deadly sins and how it undermines American virtue. The presentation is in the superficial form of satire. It is not satire. It is dead serious. And it is very effective. Not only does it present a great deal of material quickly an effectively, but, by putting it into a moral context, it really cuts to the heart of why huge government programs such as Medicare are so bad for the country. An accomplished performance by an unaplogetic conservative. Easy to read and well worth reading.

Very entertaining!

This book is really a satire against Medicare. It is written from the perspective of one of the Devil's executives. This executive writes a memo (essentially the whole book) to his boss (The Devil) about how well Medicare is working out in their malevolent plan. I considered it very entertaining reading.

The devil made me do it.

Professor David Hyman has used the seven deadly sins to serve up an easy to read description of the Medicare mess. His satirical approach is both amusing and on target. I think this small volume is required reading for both the layman and the expert. The book supplies a historical perspective, and provides a useful focus on the Medicare problem areas. I think this focus and fact driven perspective is essential, if the nation is to make any progress confounding Mephistopheles.

In using satire as a vehicle for analysis, Hyman provides a biting analysis easy to digest.

No ordinary survey, MEDICARE MEETS MEPHISTOPHELES takes the form of allegory, and is written as a memorandum from an underling demon to the devil himself. Devilish details demonstrate Medicare's pitfalls and the foundations that only undermine honesty and encourage greed and profiteering. In using satire as a vehicle for analysis, Hyman provides a biting analysis easy to digest. Diane C. Donovan California Bookwatch