Does life, or at least economics, imitate art?
Wearing a helmet while motorcycling in Texas is not mandatory. Indeed, Texas is one of six states that have repealed mandatory helmet laws since 1994. The consequences remind me of an old Faye Kellerman novel, Prayers for the Dead, about a transplant surgeon who is active in a motorcycle club because he wants to discourage helmet use in order to increase the supply of transplantable organs (motor vehicle deaths being a major source of organs).
A recent unpublished study links changes in state laws on mandatory helmet laws to the supply of transplantable organs, showing that where and when helmet wearing was no longer required, the supply of organs for transplants in the state increased.
I’m all in favor of increasing the supply of organs for transplant, as there is currently a substantial shortage of transplantable organs. Some economists have argued for a free market in organs that lets the market establish a price.
I find that repugnant; I don’t want people selling their kidneys, just as I find the Kellerman doctor’s behavior repugnant. Perhaps the best hope, or at least the most moral, may be the incentive that today’s shortages provide for innovation of trans-species or, better still, artificial organs for transplants.
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I believe there is much more room to advance the efficiency of organ transplants (ie. kidney chain). Also, we could increase the supply by “nudging” our population to becoming kidney donors.
Differences in helmet laws is a zero-sum game. You are essentially shifting life away from (stupid) motorcyclist and giving it to the sick.
“I don’t want” isn’t much of an argument.
Clearly there’s reason to be worried about abuses in an unregulated market for solid organs, but a good case can be made that a well-regulated market would be beneficial for all concerned. (See James Stacey Taylor’s book, “Stakes and Kidneys.”
I ride a motorcycle. I wear a helmet.
The question: where is the line between individual freedom and the obligation of government to protect us?
I guess that since I choose to ride with a helmet, it is acceptable to me that others ride without. I may need an organ. But I would never push others to ride without protection. I always encourage everyone to wear a helmet and other protective gear. ‘All the gear, all the time.”
So, because you find organ markets distasteful you want the state to use the threat of violence to keep people from making voluntary agreements with what to do with their own body that make EVERYONE better off?
What makes you think you have a higher moral claim to other peoples’ bodies than they themselves do?
“Perhaps the best hope, or at least the most moral, may be the incentive that today’s shortages provide for innovation of trans-species…organs”
Artificial organs–maybe. Even better would be organs cloned from the patient’s own tissue.
But how is the involuntary manipulation of a healthy, innocent animals to provide organs for sick animals more moral than getting them from willing donors who die from their own idiocy or willing donors who seek to improve their lot in life through a voluntary transaction?
But does removing helmets increase demand as well?
They aren’t your kidneys to control. Freedom means accepting that others will make choices inconsistent with your own preferences.
The quickest, easiest way to increase the supply of some organs is to allow people to sell them, rather than making the ill wait years (or even die waiting) for innovation to save them.
To that point, I have wondered recently why the state of Texas makes such a strong push for all drivers and passengers to wear their seatbelts. They must spend millions on all the television, radio, and roadside advertisements. Along with that, I would expect as more people are made aware of the law, the state revenues from tickets to drivers not wearing seatbelts are decreasing. If you assume that more people wearing seatbelts leads to fewer traffic deaths, you would also lose this benefit of the supply of organs for transplant.
All of this begs the question: why? Is there a huge economic cost to the state caused by a high number of traffic deaths? if not, is there some other reason that the state would make such a strong push? Is its the state’s repsonsibility to keep its passengers “safe”?
I would really appreciate your input on this.