US Healthcare vs. other Healthcare Systems: How are they different?

Source: Jerusalem Post

The economic principle I’m exploring is: “Institutions are the "rules of the game" that influence choices"

My research question to help me study the economic principle is: "How does the United States differ from other countries in healthcare policy and structure?”

 The Article “Comparisons of Healthcare Systems in the United States, Germany, and Canada” published by the National Center for Biotechnology demonstrates this principle by breaking down all of the different healthcare structures in each country and highlighting the key differences between them. 

 First, the largest difference between most healthcare systems and the United States is that The United States operates on private market healthcare systems, and does not have a single nationwide system of health insurance. Most other countries have some form of universal health care, in which there is only one system that everybody falls under, but the US is not this way. In the US, health insurance is either purchased in the private marketplace or provided by the government to certain groups. Statistics show that “About 84% of the population is covered by either public (26%) or private (70%) health insurance.” And about “61% of health insurance coverage is employment related” due to savings. This is much different from Germany for example, who provides free healthcare for all under one system. Healthcare in America is also not mandatory, so more than 42 million Americans are living without healthcare insurance.

 Secondly, another difference between them is cost of healthcare. The article had a table showing the three different countries, and healthcare spending by each country. The table showed that the United States has the “largest GDP per capita and the largest healthcare spending per capita”. The article also goes on to state how the US Medical care spending is the highest in the world, both person to person spending and as a percentage of GDP. This could be detrimental for the US in the future, as these costs begin to rise more and more until it gets to a point where it is just too high and the whole system needs a reboot.

 Thirdly, I will discuss some of the overall struggles that each system of healthcare faces due to their own structures, and some of the trade-offs. The US has the highest expenditures on healthcare, but also with the private healthcare system the wait times are often shorter. The article also goes on to state how generally most Americans feel unhappy with our current healthcare system, and believe that changes need to be put in place for large reformations of the system. However with all of the up and down sides of it all, the article states that “data from different countries may not be directly comparable for several reasons and therefore, should be accepted with some skepticism”. While all of this data shows clear differences and some of it points to one healthcare system being better than another, there are so many other minor factors that it is really hard to tell what should be done and that is what makes healthcare such a big issue.

In my next blog post I will research the question: What are the top drivers for cost in the American Healthcare system?