Bare Necessities

I came across this quote from Daniel Miessler:

Socialism for necessities, capitalism for everything else…why does this never seem to come up? Both systems have benefits and flaws…why not try to maximize the benefits and minimize the flaws???

But necessities can increase
without cease,
until the budget bloat
is too big to sugarcoat.

The bigger question is: does one person's need create a claim on other people?

If  you say yes, it leads to a need to resolve competing "needs", because people have limited wealth and power. There's only so much pie to go around.

You see it in the healthcare debate. The single-payer people first argue that there's a moral need to provide care regardless of a patient's ability to pay. But once in power, they always turn around and argue that there's a social need to cut back on various kinds of unnecessary care.

In the end, they mess up the supply
so there's even less pie.