The Pros And Cons Of Universal Healthcare
The Department of Professional Labor, a coalition of unions under the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, defines US healthcare as a hybrid system, containing aspects of a single-payer and a multi-payer system (Dorning, 2016). However, this hybrid system is inadequate; according to Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), an organization of medical faculty, in addition to exorbitant prices and unavailability to the majority of the population, discrimination is a major problem in American healthcare (Kliff, 2014). Academic articles state that African Americans, immigrants, and the mentally ill homeless get a lower quality of care as healthy whites (Derose, Bahney, Lurie, & Escarce, 2009; Hardy-Waller,
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By implementing universal healthcare funded mainly by the government and less by private insurers, everyone will get equal quality of care; in Finland, where about 97% of the healthcare industry works in the public sector, free universal healthcare provided by the government directly results in high quality care (Greve, 2016). By switching to a government-funded health care system, universal healthcare will also eliminate profit, a main motive for discrimination in America. The drafters of Obamacare relied on private insurers who focused more on maximizing shareholders’ profit. So, these insurers would deny coverage and cancel policies for anyone that would lower profit, which typically were minorities and the mentally ill. Switching to universal healthcare would provide coverage based solely on residence in the U.S. (Caruso, Himmelstein & Woolhandler, 2015). Nevertheless, universal healthcare has many drawbacks. For instance, many people, especially the middle class, will be vexed due to long waiting times and increased taxes. There is also no absolute way to guarantee that universal healthcare will eliminate discrimination in healthcare (Epstain, 2005). However, since these problems aren’t widely prevalent in many countries with universal care like Finland, we can infer that this will be true in America as well, making it the best solution for our currently inadequate health system (Greve,
By implementing universal healthcare funded mainly by the government and less by private insurers, everyone will get equal quality of care; in Finland, where about 97% of the healthcare industry works in the public sector, free universal healthcare provided by the government directly results in high quality care (Greve, 2016). By switching to a government-funded health care system, universal healthcare will also eliminate profit, a main motive for discrimination in America. The drafters of Obamacare relied on private insurers who focused more on maximizing shareholders’ profit. So, these insurers would deny coverage and cancel policies for anyone that would lower profit, which typically were minorities and the mentally ill. Switching to universal healthcare would provide coverage based solely on residence in the U.S. (Caruso, Himmelstein & Woolhandler, 2015). Nevertheless, universal healthcare has many drawbacks. For instance, many people, especially the middle class, will be vexed due to long waiting times and increased taxes. There is also no absolute way to guarantee that universal healthcare will eliminate discrimination in healthcare (Epstain, 2005). However, since these problems aren’t widely prevalent in many countries with universal care like Finland, we can infer that this will be true in America as well, making it the best solution for our currently inadequate health system (Greve,