How Do You Think Health Care Should Be Handled in the United

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The Answer is Students' answers will vary.The provision of health care today in the United States is expensive and complex.For more than a century, U..politicians have been debating the issue of national health insurance-a publicly funded program that would expand the current system of health-care provision to give some level of coverage to everyone, regardless of their ability to pay.Much of the debate about establishing a national system has historically focused on two issues-cost and freedom of choice.Questions involve what types of coverage should be included and how coverage should be funded.The freedom-of-choice debate also concerns the extent to which each citizen could choose his or her own health-care provider.The United States has a strongly ingrained commitment to freedom of choice.Prior to 2010, all industrialized countries except for the United States had established some kind of national system so that all citizens would have access to some type of health-care coverage.After a long and bitter debate, Congress passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA), also often referred to as Obamacare.The intention of the law is to reduce the inequalities in health care by requiring all U..citizens and legal residents to have medical insurance.Those who cannot afford health insurance will be provided it by raising taxes on those who have higher incomes.Only as the years pass will people see what impact this law has on inequalities in health care.In advance, however, people can be certain that the law will not eliminate the inequalities.These are built into our social structure.People with higher incomes will always be able to afford higher-quality medical care.And unless there is fundamental change-which there will not be-people living in poverty will continue to be exposed to more harmful conditions at work.In the absence of such fundamental change, they will also continue to eat less healthy food, exercise less, and have a higher rate of obesity.The end result is that they will continue to suffer from more health problems and to die at a younger age.Adversaries of the ACA vehemently say that it is not possible to provide better service to more people without incurring more costs.The law requires "virtually all Americans to purchase health insurance or pay a fine. Many small business owners maintain they can't afford health insurance for all employees and that the Act involves "an onslaught of new taxes and burdensome paperwork;" it may be much more economical for them to forego the tax credit rather than purchase expensive insurance.​

How Do You Think Health Care Should Be Handled in the United

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