The yearly expense of a family health plan is approximately $16,351, a figure that to the majority of families in the United States is unaffordable (Kamrany, 2014). “In a single-payer system, a public entity, such as the government, would pay all the medical bills for a certain population, rather than insurance companies doing that work” (“Doctors Warm to Single-Payer Health Care”, 2017). The United States federal government should provide health care to all its citizens with a single payer system, giving doctors and patients autonomy eliminating the exaggerated expensive costs and cover all Americans for medically necessary services. In a survey by Lake Snell Perry Mermin ranking people’s personal economic worries five percent picked losing their job, nine percent rising gas prices, twelve percent higher taxes, fourteen percent a secure retirement, eighteen percent wages not keeping up with costs, and twenty-seven percent picked rising health care costs as their chief economic worry (Teixeira, 2005). With the extremely high and unaffordable costs of health care in America, it comes as no surprise that more than half of the country is on board with a single-payer health care system. A new national survey done by Pew Research Center reveals that the majority of Americans believe it is the federal government’s responsibility to provide health care to all Americans. “Currently, sixty percent say the federal government is responsible for ensuring health care
Currently the United States has the most expensive health care system in the world and some 45 million Americans are uninsured under the current health system, these numbers continues to grow. Using the theory of an Utilitarianism perspective and developing a single-payer system such as universal health care all Americans could enjoy equal access to quality health care. The single-payer system will provide tools to manage health spending more effectively and ensure health care for everyone. If the United States would follow the blueprint of other developed nations who have successfully implemented universal health care coverage it would protect citizens from high medical premiums, co-payments and give everyone access to equal health care. In the United States people go without health coverage, it is a problem that needs to be resolved, yet we remain one of the last developed countries to implement universal health care coverage. Despite efforts to enact polices for
In a country where healthcare is a decision, many debate if our country should keep our health care system privatized. Health care is an essential need in society because individual health can change at any time without warning at any time. While there are both pros and cons of this system, the pros outway the cons. I believe that our nation should ensure basic health care to all legal citizens, no matter the class. Many Americans fall into circumstances where they are not able to pay the expensive bills that privatized insurance companies billhave so they do not have chose to not have insurance at all. Universal health care gives those people the means of financial support when they medically need
With rising healthcare costs being distributed predominantly on workers or their companies, the economic responsibility is placed on the very people who need it the least: the job creators. If the economic responsibility of healthcare costs was shifted to the government, the private sector job creators could have more revenue to stimulate the economy with additional jobs, better wages, and improved worker benefits. The best way to shift this cost obligation is via a single-payer healthcare system. A single-payer would make sure all citizens would be covered for all medical services, including doctor, hospital, preventive, long-term care, mental health, reproductive health care, dental, vision, prescription drug, and medical supply costs.
The concept of a national single-payer health care system in America is far from a new one. In his journal, Dr. Jonathan Oberlander (2016) listed some of the proposals that have been made in the United States over the years. The first on his list was a bill that was created in 1943 with plans to establish a payroll tax-funded health insurance for the whole country; despite the
It takes very little to disrupt the slow but steady healing progress our nation has undertaken in the wake of the financial crisis of seven years ago. As President Barack Obama once said, by signing the Affordable Care Act into law, “everyone should have some basic security when it comes to their health care” (Stolberg, Sheryl Gay) . Something as influential as a universal health care bill is no exception to delicate recovery the United States economy has undertaken over the past several years. As in the Affordable Care Act’s name, health care should be affordable for people of all tax brackets. While many are concerned of the repercussions this health care bill will not only have on employment opportunities but also higher taxes,
Long before the 1990s when Ms. Clinton fought for a Universal Healthcare system in America, the issue of America’s healthcare had been a political quandary. The enactment of the Republican administration’s Health Management Organization Act of 1973 was a weapon meant to address that crisis, yet, it did little to fix the problem. While the liberal Democrats are fighting for Universal Healthcare coverage for all Americans, the conservative Republicans are fighting to maintain the current private health insurance, however, with some revamping of the system, which preserves the capitalistic element of the status quo. The reason for the two opposing views stems from their differences in political ideologies, which theoretically is like pitting socialism against capitalism. While the liberal Democrats’ endorsement of Universal Healthcare system is socialistic in practice, the conservative Republicans’ fight to retain the private or market based plan is unarguably in support of their pro-capitalism stance. The truth, however, is that, though almost every American believes in capitalism, yet, almost none would vote to disband the Medicare and the Medicaid programs, both of which are socialistic. In that light, the argument of a pro-capitalist nation is negated, as we do already have a socialized healthcare program for the seniors and the poor. Extending that concept to include
In today’s day and age, American households can all agree that health insurance is not a luxury, but a necessity. Without it, costs of emergency room visits and prescription medicines can be financially devastating. However, in the past many families and individuals have taken the risk of not being insured due to the high cost of the insurance itself. To attempt to reform this unfair system, the Obama administration signed into law the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in 2010. The law, coined “Obamacare,” has received much opposition due to its expansion government programs and increase in spending. It brings to question how much the government should be involved in an area that for the majority of America’s history, has been
America faces a choice, keep The Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare, or scrap it and come up with something better. The ACA in its entirety leaves room for improvement. It could do better, much better, if it weren’t for matters of political expediency. Currently the United States spends more on health care than any other country. According to a Huffington Post article (2013) the U.S. spends about 17.2 percent of their GDP on medical care. Health care per capita is approximately $8,608, second only to Switzerland, which spends $9,121.
Obamacare has drastically raised health care costs for individuals and families. One of the reasons Obamacare was established was to reduce family premiums by $2,500 a year (Anderson 1). However, this goal has not been accomplished yet, the typical family premiums are increasing at rapid rates (Anderson 2). From 2015-2016, Family Silver, one of the most popular family insurance plans, had a ten percent increase on their premiums price. Some states even rose by forty percent (Furchtgott-Roth 3). Middle class families cannot keep paying an arm and a leg for health insurance. Health insurance should not be a major issue for Americans, it should be
The Affordable Care Act or ACA (often called ObamaCare) was signed into law on 23 March 2010 by President Obama. The ACA is a vastly wide-ranging piece of legislation which touches on many facets of our health care system. It is comprised of the Affordable Health Care for America Act, the Patient Protection Act, and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act. This act is known as being one of the most comprehensive reforms of the United States medical care system in the last several decades, as it put in place broad transformations that are supposed to increase access to reasonably priced health insurance for everyone. The ACA renovates the non-group insurance market in the United States, dictates citizens have health insurance, considerably expands public insurance, subsidizes private insurance, increases revenues from an assortment of new tax laws, and lessens and restructures spending under the country's largest health insurance plan, Medicare.
“President Obama made this telling claim about his signature health-care law: Americans are “Going to the able to sign up for affordable, quality health insurance at a significantly cheaper rate than what they can get right now in the individual market.” (Roy p.1) Since President Obama introduced the legislation bill of the Affordable Care Act, there has been mixed feelings, as a nation, on how it can possibly affect their lives, but more importantly, the economy that is already in chaos. It is interesting to see that even though the nation as a whole is not in favor of the Affordable Care Act, the population will still be in favor of what the Democratic party proposes for
The U.S. is an industrialized nation that continues to be behind on providing health care coverage to all citizens. However, the German health care system came up with a plan that ensured all citizens are provided with some form of health care coverage; nevertheless, the U.S. continues to dispute health care reform and how to provide coverage to all citizens. “Health spending per capita in the United States is much higher than in other countries – at least $2,535 dollars, or 51%, higher than Norway, the next largest per capita spender. Furthermore, the United States spends nearly double the average $3,923 for the 15 countries ("Health Care Cost," 2011, table 1)”.
Yes it is shocking, but what’s even more shocking is what this bill really means to the American people…the Affordable Care Act is a very destructive set of laws, that can and probably will devastate our nation. First I would like to address the fact that this law should not be referred to as the Affordable Care Act; because, it is anything but affordable. Can we afford higher premiums, higher taxes, budget deficit increases, hiring freezes, slashed workers hours, killing existing jobs, and killing new jobs? No, we cannot afford any of these issues, but we will because of the Affordable Care Act. Health care in America will be…the "straw that broke the camel’s back".
U.S. health care reform is currently one of the most heavily discussed topics in health discourse and politics. After former President Clinton’s failed attempt at health care reform in the mid-1990s, the Bush administration showed no serious efforts at achieving universal health coverage for the millions of uninsured Americans. With Barack Obama as the current U.S. President, health care reform is once again a top priority. President Obama has made a promise to “provide affordable, comprehensive, and portable health coverage for all Americans…” by the end of his first term (Barackobama.com). The heated debate between the two major political parties over health care reform revolves around how to pay for it and more importantly, whether it
A single payer national health care program could save American?s billions of dollars currently being spent on health care and insurance. A 2000 report by John Sheils and Randall Haught of the Lewin group on the costs and impact of a health care system in the state of Maryland showed that a single payer system implemented in that state would save its citizens 346.8 million dollars a year.(3) The majority of savings from this would come from vast reductions in administrative costs associated with insurance companies and the filing of claims. Sheils also reports that the average family would spend 261 dollars less each year on health costs (7). John Canham-Clyne notes in his book The Rational Option that a single payer bill proposed in the Senate was estimated to save the American public $110 billion a year by the Congressional Budget Office(24). The savings