THE CASE FOR A FREE MARKET IN BODY PARTS by Walter Block
3 min readSep 16, 2019
The Case for a Free
Market in Body Parts
Walter Block
I n days of yore, there was no “crisis” in spare body parts.
Organ transplants were an utter impossibility, the stuff of
science fiction. But nowadays, thanks to the magnificent dis-
coveries and new techniques of modern medicine, it is possi-
ble to transplant hearts, livers, kidneys, corneas, and other
organs. People who would have been consigned to death, or
tenuous and painful lives only a few years ago, can today
avail themselves of these medical miracles and lead healthy,
productive lives.
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However, instead of being the occasion for unrelieved re-
joicing, these new breakthroughs have given us a whole host
of new problems.
Most important, there is a shortage of body organs suit-
able for transplant, which has strained medical ethics to the
breaking point. For, given the limited supply of donor-
organs, our doctors have had to choose which of the many
needy recipients shall have this life-giving aid and which
shall not. And the doctors have no criteria upon which to
base the choice other than their own arbitrary decision.
The difficulty is that our legal-economic system has not
kept up with medical technology. The law prohibits people
from using the property rights we each have in our own per-
sons. Specifically, it has banned trade, or a marketplace, in
live spare body parts.
What? Allow the profit incentive to work in this field? The
very idea brings to mind images of grave robbers, Franken-
stein monsters, and gangs of “organ thieves” stealing people’s
hearts, livers, and kidneys, as in Robin Cook’s novels.
But let’s consider this idea on its own merits. Will a free
market increase the number of donors, save lives, and free
doctors from the need to pick which people shall be saved
and which consigned to a lingering and painful death?
As any first year student in economics can tell us, when-
ever a good is in short supply, its price is too low. And the
case of spare body parts is no exception. In fact, the laws that
prohibit a marketplace in human organs have effectively im-
posed a zero price on these items. At a zero price, we cannot
be surprised that the demand for human organs has vastly
outstripped the supply.
If the price of human organs were allowed to rise to its
market level, barring new technological breakthroughs in ar-
tificial organs, there would still be a high demand from peo-
ple needing an organ transplant to sustain their lives. Thus
the immediate effect of a free market would be mainly on the
amount supplied.
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THE FREE MARKET READER
While it is never possible to fully know how an industry
now prohibited by government edict would function, we can
anticipate that the major sources would be young healthy
people killed in car and other accidents and people who die
from diseases such as heart attacks, which leave their other
organs undamaged.
If the organ industry were legalized, new firms would spring
up, or perhaps insurance companies and hospitals would do
the work. These companies or hospitals would offer thou-
sands of dollars to people who met the appropriate medical
criteria if they agreed that upon their death their organs
would be owned by the firm in question. Then these firms
would in turn sell these organs, for a profit, to people in need
of a transplant.
In addition these new firms would, as at present, try to
obtain consent from the relatives of newly deceased persons
for use of their organs. But only under a free market could
these firms offer cash incentives for donors, not to mention
the chance to save another life.
The effect of programs would be to vastly increase the
supply of donor organs. No longer would potential recipients
have to make do without transplants. And because the sys-
tem is based on freedom, those who objected on religious or
other grounds would not have to take part.
Nor need we fear that those who engaged in this business
would earn “exorbitant” profits. For any such tendency
would call forth new entrants into the market, increasing
supply even further, and reducing profits to levels which
could be earned elsewhere.
Liberty is the answer. If we want to save the American
people pain, sorrow, suffering, and tragedy, we will work to
institute a free market in body parts.
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