When I think of universal healthcare, I immediately think of the
Affordable Care Act. Addition, I immediately think of controversy.
The ACA was intended to ensure everyone had equal opportunity to
participate in health insurance and have the same access to
healthcare. One of the biggest debates behind this is that it
ultimately, did not meet that expectation. Our healthcare was
extended to millions of American citizens, in addition to eliminating
pre-exiting conditions, healthcare is still far from affordable. By
natural factors and common sense, this does not mean everyone has
access to healthcare. In my experience, this country operates more
on capitalism versus the Socialism model. The free market gives
people a choice and promotes competition. There are many in this
country who feel that the government should not be involved in the
personal healthcare decisions of their constituents. At full disclosure,
I am one of those people. One of the biggest push backs to universal
healthcare is that individual citizens don't want to pay for it. Local,
county, state, and of course, bro officials have never unveil the plan
to appropriately pay for it without increasing taxes more than 20%.
In our society, it's not acceptable. Cut expenses elsewhere, come up
with a good delivery strategy, and execute appropriately. Our
government officials have not unveiled a plan that will do that.
On the grand scheme of the healthcare landscape in our country, we
already provide different forms of supplemental healthcare. Medicare
and Medicaid or two of those programs. While not necessarily
healthcare, Social Security is another government sponsored
program. You contribute to it and it's plain math. We are spending
more than we are bringing in. Medicare, based on our previous
discussion group, has confirmed that $644 billion is annually spent by
the government. I don't think that universal healthcare is necessarily
just about the fact that people want what they want. I think it's also a
question of sustainability. Truly believe that most "Reasonable
"human beings think that everyone should have some form of
accessible healthcare. End of the day however, free is not actually
free. Everything cost someone something. This topic will not go away
for the foreseeable future. Ultimately however I don't think universal
healthcare will be accomplished in my lifetime.
References:
Roland, James. “The Pros and Cons of Obamacare.” Healthline,
Healthline Media, 17 Aug.
2019, https://www.healthline.com/health/consumer-healthcare-
guide/pros-and-cons-obamacare
.
“The ACA Debate Shows We Need to Change How We Talk about
Health.” SPH The ACA Debate Shows We Need to Change How We Talk
About Health Comments, 12 Apr.
2019, https://www.bu.edu/sph/news/articles/2019/the-aca-debate-
shows-we-need-to-change-how-we-talk-about-health/
.
