2/24/2015

Healthcare Economics

Healthcare Economics

In my last post I commented on some of what I feel are negative aspects of current healthcare legislation.  To be fair, in this post I would like to point out a few attributes that can be construed as positive from my point of view as a hospital employee. 

 For example, Obamacare requires people to have insurance or pay a tax.  While many people would see this as negative because they now have to pay money for insurance they do not feel they need, healthcare organizations see this as a positive.  This is because the number of people that are uninsured has declined.  This should in turn increase the demand for healthcare because more people will have coverage.  Hypothetically, having coverage should reduce the price people will have to pay for healthcare and reduce some of the risk hospitals face with collecting payment for services.

Another up-side to Obamacare is the pay for performance measures.  As hospitals improve their quality they are reimbursed more from the federal government and if a hospitals quality declines they are reimbursed less.  This is a great incentive for hospitals to improve their quality which leads to better care for patients.  Economically this means that hospitals can increase the amount they are being paid by increasing quality.  Thus there will be a greater supply of quality services and a smaller supply of inferior services.   

There are a few other positive points related to Obamacare.  I have listed the two I feel are most beneficial to the hospital I work at.  However I still believe the bad outweighs the good.  Following are two links to articles that shed greater light on this subject. 




1 comment:

Dave Tufte said...

Joey: 94/100 (you mean hospital's not hospitals)

As a healthcare professional, I'm surprised you missed the big reason healthcare providers wanted Obamacare. In the past, they've had big problems collecting for services rendered from people who don't have insurance. They want those more people signed up for programs that make sure the provider gets paid.