As statistics show, there has already been an increase in the cost of health care partially due to the shortage in health care practitioners and the need to offer higher reimbursement for treatments. If predictions are true, and there is a shortage of 125,000 physicians by the year 2025, the cost of health care will increase more rapidly. Because health care and therefore an individual’s life is considered priceless, there are demand shifters that often affect the demand curve of a health care product. As demonstrated in the example above, physician loyalties and experience are just two of the many types of demand shifters. This demand shifters can cause an even steeper rise in health care cost in the real world.
Matthew Holt who wrote an article called, “Why is Fixing American Health Care so Difficult?” According to Matthew Holt there are two main reasons why universal health coverage is so hard to accomplish. That’s because such a small population of America is sick and most of the health care dollars get spent on it. There needs to be a transfer of money from the healthy and the wealthy in order to pay for these sick people and the costs are beyond the means of the individuals concerned and their families. So in order to pay for the health care of these sick people and the rest of America, the healthy and wealthy would need to step in and help. This means that the government would have to find
In operational the business processes appearing to add cost without creating value. The United States health care system is overcome with excessive spending in administrative expenses, such as poor management and appropriate care. The excessive spending in administrative cost contributes to the rising cost of health care premiums. The United States is spending too much for health care because of
E. Reinhardt tackles the misconception of why American health care cost so much. . Reinhardt argues that American’s use of high cost, high tech procedures may only partially explain why American healthcare is among the highest in the
Researchers have identified an association between household income inequality and mortality rates. The Robin Hood Index is a chart that displays the distribution of income and the mortality rate within each state. Consequently, the results show the more unequal the distribution of income, the higher the death rate. The large gap between America’s poor and wealthy can cause major depression and low-self-esteem to our citizens. This gap is also being said to cause “higher prevalence of hypertension and smoking, and higher rates of teen pregnancy and birth, as well as lower self-rated health (i.e., people reporting that their health is only fair or poor, as opposed to excellent or very good)” (Page
A third contributing factor is very interrelated to nursing education is that nursing education has shifted from hospital-based diploma programs to university and college programs. This shift created the need for hospitals to increase the percentage of paid nursing staff to keep up with the demand of related to the void of care provided by nursing students (Fox & Abrahamson, 2009). A fourth factor contributing to the current nursing shortage is the economic stress that nursing turnover creates in the healthcare setting. The nursing profession can be stressful mentally, physically, and emotionally creating an argument that nurses are not adequately compensated for their working environment. With other less stressful professional occupations available to a profession that is primarily female individuals are leaving the profession (Fox & Abrahamson, 2009).
It has been estimated by several economists that $339 billion a year in additional taxes will be the bare minimum needed to compensate for the high cost of health care. This means that most tax rates would increase by over 10% (Tanner). Also, as proven by multiple studies, when given a financial incentive to do so, consumers make cost-conscious decisions in most circumstances (Tanner). Hence, if we give everyone the green light and open the door to health services without it directly affecting how much they have to pay, nothing is stopping them from abusing the system. If such abuses of the system occur nation-wide, which would likely happen, the cost of health
The housing market also plummeted leading to negative equity, which the majority of the working class could not afford resulting in the repossession of their houses combined with the drastic increase in unemployment Britain was in a mess. However Major did have some success, he abolished poll tax, which was very popular among the public, he increased spending on the NHS and introduced transport subsides to keep travel fares low.
AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE The Healthcare Industry is a 2.8 trillion dollar industry. From issues like personal bank-ruptcy, overpaid executives in the healthcare industry, inconsistent pricing from health care pro-viders and hospitals and patients not able to afford to have health care, there was a need for health care reform. Due to several inefficiencies that drove up the cost of healthcare, a reduced standard of care to patients, and Americans that could not afford to have health care, the Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010. Some of the key goals of the ACA were to reduce the rate of health care spending and the burden it placed on families, businesses, employers and state and federal budgets as well as improving the quality of care provided to patients. One of the provisions in the ACA is that all Americans are required to have health insurance.
The Rising Costs of Healthcare 1 The Rising Costs of Healthcare Top Reasons Why We Are Seeing Rises in Healthcare Cost Chris Franz Kaplan University MT305 Professor Schreeder October 10, 2009 The Rising Costs of Healthcare 2 The face of healthcare today is ever changing in all aspects, whether talking on a technological side or a political side. As healthcare professionals, patients, insurance agencies, and medical companies, we must evolve and keep up with the changes that come each year. In this paper we are going to discuss some of the biggest cost impacts we see every year in healthcare. Some of the areas we will concentrate on are insurance, advances in medical care, demographics, changes in patient provider relationships, government support, and consumer expectations. The subject we are going to tackle first is how health insurance in general, influences costs each year.