Healthcare Post #2

     One of the biggest worries in the United States today is the economy. It has been in a spiral since 2008 and no one knows what to expect. In the United States, the economy shapes the complex interactions among employment, health coverage and costs, and financial access to care and health outcomes. I want to dive into how healthcare affects our economy.
    Healthcare accounts for about one-sixth of the entire economy — more than any other industry.
Spending on health care totals about $2.5 trillion, 17.5% of our gross domestic product. Spending includes: hospitals, clinics, outpatient facilities, surgical equipment, prescription and non-prescription drugs, premiums, co-payments, etc. It is a growing industry, but is inefficient at its current status. Patients oftentimes don't know whats best for them and are victims of unnecessary spending, which is a huge waste. Fixing it would free up money for other priorities, such as education and industrial innovation.Growth in overall health care costs, including spending on the huge Medicare and Medicaid programs, is out of control. It limits how much money the federal government and businesses have to invest in solving the energy problem, developing products that can be sold to other countries, creating technology that can bring medical breakthroughs, building infrastructure and more. At its current status, the healthcare system is flawed.
      The price of healthcare is also an issue. For individuals and small businesses it is way too much. Too much of their paycheck is going to healthcare costs, so they in turn have less money to spend on themselves and other needs. Some people can't even afford it, so guess who is paying for their treatment? Everyone else. Over 50 million Americans don't have health insurance and the other citizens are paying for it. Hospitals, particularly in inner-city and rural areas, charge patients with insurance more to help make up for those who can't pay their bills. And we're all paying more in taxes to cover extra payments by federal and state governments to hospitals that have large shares of uninsured patients. Fortunately, the healthcare system is one of the only industries that is continuously growing. This vastly helps employment due to all the jobs it provides.
       President Obama Obama and Congress are trying to reduce the rate at which health care spending is growing, by eliminating waste and fraud, improving efficiency and increasing preventive care, so it's unlikely jobs at health care providers will decline. In fact, more caregivers will be needed for aging baby boomers, plus the millions who could get coverage under health care reform and presumably would seek care more regularly. To solve our current problems, we must work to make healthcare affordable for everyone.