Healthcare Across the World

 

Source: Commonwealthfund

 The economic principle I’m exploring is Institutions are the “rules of the game” that influence choices My research question to help me study the economic principle is ¨How does the United States American Healthcare compare to other countries?’’ The article/video/etc published in The Commonwealth Fund titled “U.S. Health Care from a Global Perspective” demonstrates this economic principle because it shows based on location(country) the level of healthcare changes for everyone, and the baseline for healthcare changes as well. Some countries allow for companies to have a big say, others, not so much. This data analyzes 13 high-income countries: New Zealand, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, France, Germany, Japan, Netherlands, Canada, Denmark, Australia, United Kingdom, and the United States. In 2013 the U.S. spent way more for health care compared to the other countries. The United States had higher spending due to the large use of medical technology and higher health care prices. Compared to other countries having cheaper more frequent doctor visits. Americans tend to have less hospital visits and admissions because of the use of very expensive medical technologies in hospitals, which explains why American health care can be so unbelievably expensive. United States healthcare spending does exceed the spending of most other countries, but the spending has been decreasing and slowing down. The United States is the only country, from the list, that does not have a publicly financed universal health care system, but it does spend more public dollars on it then all the countries but two. The United States spend quite little on social service programs: housing assistance, employment programs, disability benefits, and food security. This has had an effect on the outcome for Americans healthwise. The United states does see worse results on health outcome measures like life expectancy and chronic conditions, compared to the other countries. This is evidence that there is an inefficiency within the United States healthcare system. In most cases, when you pay more for something you get higher quality goods, items, or care, but this isn’t always the case in America. Americans are paying more to have better care and outcomes but the average American isn’t getting that. Americans skip out on doctor visits, hospitalization, medicines, and treatments due to the fact it’s not affordable. The United States spends 17.1% of its gross domestic product(GDP) on healthcare, this was in 2013. This is about 50% more than the list’s next highest spender which was France with an 11.6% GDP, and was double compared to what was spent in the United Kingdom, 8.8% GPD.

   The United States Public spending is overly high even though it covers few residents in the States. Public spending per person in the United States was $4,197, this was more than any country except Norway, $4,981, and Netherland, $4,495. Both Netherlands and Norway have a universal health care system, something the U.S. does not have. In the United States, only about 34% of people were covered by public health programs like Medicare and Medicaid. Unlike the United Kingdom, which has a universal public health system which covers every resident and only spend $2,802. This fact proves the efficiency of the American Health System. The United States is spending about double what the United Kingdom is, yet are health care provided in America falls short. A lot of Americans are not getting the care the need due to the high costs. If people cannot get healthcare they will get sick and cost the American economy more money since they cannot contribute fully to the economy. They will either not have excess money to have purchasing power or they will be too sick to work and be put on benefit programs. I believe there needs to be some sort of reform in the healthcare system since there is an obvious imbalance within it.

 In my next blog post I will research: Reforms in the healthcare system