Single Payer Healthcare Policy

Single payer health policies include providing equal health care to all people in the United States. That is, a system in which quasi-institutions fund healthcare and leave the role of providing that healthcare service to the private sector. The primary goal of this policy is to ensure that all U.S. citizens have access to quality health care through medical services and to seek the best physicians, To ensure access to hospitals. In particular, funding is the most difficult factor hindering the promotion of health services in the country. This policy should be underpinned by the savings gained by replacing today’s inefficient methods, which makes it profit oriented and streamlined, while public payer model is nonprofit oriented, which means that collection of new taxes that would be based on the payers’ ability to pay rather than targeting the whole US’s population. This strategy is efficient compared to the previous forms of medical policies since premiums would disappear once the strategy is implemented. It is expected that more than ninety five percent of the citizens would save their finances once the policy is applied, which implies that patients will no longer struggle to pay for their healthcare. Furthermore, they would also not experience co-payments or deductibles, enjoying the freedom of choosing their own doctors. This privilege is currently lost, and regaining it would boost quality healthcare provided to the patients. Consequently, the doctors would regain their patients’ autonomy since the level of accountability and responsibility would have increased in five folds.

Public Option Healthcare Policy

This policy is largely concerned with how far the policy can go in running a health insurance. The plan was to be modeled so that the Medicare would be set alongside other private plans operating under the ObamaCare umbrella (Blanchet and Fox 78-85). The main objective of the public option healthcare is to ensure that there is increased competition for other healthcare policies. Consequently, this would reap all benefits associated with the competition such as improved quality services and accountability among healthcare institutions.

The public option is considered as the best option for all citizens. This assumption is based on the geographic coverage of the policy. People from the rural areas only enjoy health policy. These elements continue to limit their healthcare accessibility. This policy intends to solve these challenges by ensuring that every citizen enjoys quality healthcare at an affordable cost, equally saving the ones who are at risk of enjoying none of the two healthcare policies.

This policy is expected to face stiff competition and opposition from other health insurers, doctors, and health institutions, which is based on the fact that rivalry from the Medicare is less than from other private insurers. Among other features, it causes rejection and opposition of the public. The policy was once floated during a house debate, but was kicked out before the final stage of the patient protection and affordable healthcare act.

The single-payer healthcare policy is significantly championed by the public and other institutions. However, the question remains whether the United States are ready for this policy. Such cautiousness is motivated by the requirements and objectives of the policy (Yu and Zhang 816-833). There are those who believe that it is the time that the government introduces this policy in the system, whereas others still argue that more resources and research should be dedicated to ensure that the system is flawless before its implementation.

Types of Public Option Policy

This healthcare policy exists in two forms. First, the government is planning to expand the already existing government policies such as the Medicaid and the Medicare government health insurances. Secondly, the government is planning on introducing new programs. Some of these programs include the introduction of plans that target special groups such as those above the sixty-five age bracket. Similar programs are only found in the private sectors. In the event the government successfully introduces these programs, they would offer stiff competition to these private health insurers. However, the government of planning on improving the already existing programs since they are easy to implement.

The public option is mainly targeting any uncertainties that may be expected to affect most counties in the United States (Dave 180-182). First, counties are exponentially growing in terms of population. This implies a population that is seeking quality healthcare is expected to grow. Therefore, the public option is hoping to meet this healthcare demand by the year 2018. The public policy is expected to fill those gaps that might be created by limited health policies. Furthermore, the policy is also planning to offer more consumer friendlier services and set competitive prices. Therefore, it is the objective of this policy to ensure that individual persons and the market can access affordable healthcare despite the exit of the private insurance firms and other private insurers.

Despite the government planning to introduce new plans, it is not a new policy. This policy was first introduced for discussion in 2008 by John Edwards (Merino). Every democratic candidate has attempted to introduce this policy with no success. When the affordable health act was first issued, the public option was also written as a draft, but was expelled from the house at its early stages. The rejection of the draft was as a result of opposition from the Republicans and other moderate Democrats.

Benefits of Public Option Policy

Those who propose that public option should be implemented as soon as possible argue that this would be an important step in increasing the coverage of quality and affordable healthcare in the United States (Chaufan 331-345). They argue that this strategy would improve the cost of living as the consumers would spend less on healthcare. The financial effectiveness of the policy is not only involving consumers’ cost, but also the assets needed for implementing the whole policy compared to the current system.

Cost-effectiveness of the public policy is partly dependent on administrative and billing costs, which are expected to decrease considerably once this policy is introduced into the system. Administrative costs are expected to reduce since the policy is set such that there are no such processes and technical procedures in the system (Felder et al. 32-58). In addition, the government is also expected to have a better bargaining power over pharmaceutical companies and hospitals. Currently, it can bargain for better prices with those firms that are involved in Medicare. The public policy is expected to have better bargaining powers since the coverage would be larger and involve larger populations.

The public option is not expected to earn any profit, but rather offer quality services, which means that the policy will focus on quality services. The administration is not concerned with profits like the private sectors. Besides struggling to make the profits, the public option has lesser premiums than the private policies. Furthermore, this strategy has proved to have a smaller congressional budget compared to other firms in the market.

The underlying reason for the policy’s fame and acceptance is based on the fact that people prefer to have a wide range of choices rather than limited choices. Therefore, this policy ensures that patients have a wide range of choices such as choosing their own doctors, given that Americans are well known to prefer enjoying their own choices to being subjected to the others’ decisions. This policy ensures that patients are at liberty to select their own hospitals and doctors, hence having a better chance of recovering more quickly. Besides, the policy is not compulsory for those who prefer private health insurance. Alternatively, those who would wish to continue with the public policy are also allowed to consume the it with no objection and coercion.

Benefits of Single Payer Policy

The proponents of the single-payer healthcare policy urge that it should be implemented to save the state of healthcare demands in the United States. They advocate for its implementation since this policy would round up all the commercial insurance firms to form one major firm. Furthermore, they argue that a unified payer would be easy and economical to manage, also claiming that a small vestige of the whole industry would be left to cater to the small market demands.

The single payer policy is considered as the most efficient regarding the expansion of the whole Medicaid system, which considers health improvement as the most important factor for a health insurance policy to consider. As a result, the opponents of the policy argue that the single payer model would be effective due to its cost-effectiveness. It has a lower per capita expenditure compared to all the other policies, which implies that the policy is favorable not only to management and implementation, but also ro reducing consumers’ expenditure in healthcare.

The single payer policy is also highly valued for its moral values. This model has a moral argument behind its application since its implementation is based on healthcare for all people. The advocates also argue that every person should be allowed to access affordable and cheaper health care with fewer limitations. In addition, healthcare should not be valued and considered like other services, but rather valued as an important aspect in the society. Furthermore, they also argue that this policy has a practical argument behind its application, explaining that it is more economical to apply resources when all healthcare programs are grouped instead of allowing different people to manage the industry. The main argument is that the government can reduce wastage of resources while improving the quality of services. This element is important since those resources that could have been wasted are applied in other fields in the right way.

The research carried in 2014 found out the government could save up to $375 if this policy was applied in a health sector (McDonough 702-705). Streamlining of the healthcare industry is an important step towards the achievement of quality healthcare. The single-payer healthcare insurance policy is expected to lower the number of administrative costs, which are currently considered as inefficient and unnecessary. The current system is full of repetition and is perceived as a wastage of resources. The single payer policy would combine most of these costs to achieve the expected level of efficiency. Most of the finances saved by the policy would be directed to other fields, where they would be used to serve millions of other patients. Furthermore, such strategy would be the best and the most appropriate way to secure other patients yet to be insured by the state due to the high cost of the private sectors. Consequently, this would eliminate any discrimination brought about by the existence of the wide range of insurers.

The single-payer system would restore the authority of the patients. Currently, the system is forcing most doctors to consider employment due to a large number of insurance companies. Rounding up all these insurance companies to form one single payer would create more opportunities for the physicians by increasing their level of independence. Doctors will be allowed to evaluate other areas such as providing services to patients in their own healthcare centers rather than employment. Multiple insurance companies do not allow doctors to operate independently due to a large number of bureaucratic demands. Single payer policy is expected to eliminate these problems and promote the independence of the health providers instead. Besides, doctors’ independence implies that they will be in a position to provide services more efficiently.

Differences between the Two Policies

Notably, there is a rivalry between single and public options healthcare policies. The proponents of the public option argue that having this policy in the health industry would increase the amount of competition against the private insurers, while increasing competition among insurance companies implies that the industry will attract lower prices and hence relieve patients of high costs. However, the opponents of this policy claim that introduction of public option model would suppress the operations of the private insurers, hence reducing their ability to compete with the public option, also arguing that reducing the operations of the private firms would lower their ability to produce quality services, which would eventually push them out the market.

Public option policy is considered as an unfavorable strategy since the nature of its competition is unfair and does not consider the interests of other stakeholders. The unfairness of this model would arise if the public option forced hospitals, doctors, and other service providers to charge their clients prices that are far much less than their counterparts in the private sectors. Even though this policy is expected to cater for public’s needs, research has shown that only a small percentage of the people would take up the public option as their health option. Such prediction is based on the comparison of the benefits of the people who would take this public policy and the ones of other private policies.

Public option policy is no longer a discussion since the Senate has unanimously kicked out the program. It was replaced with a completely different program that allows negotiation of prices with lower premiums, which is in fact much lower than the private sector’s strategies. The rejection of public option is also based on the availability of a program. It is argued that this policy would not be available to all people, which means that the program would favor fewer people compared to other strategies, especially at the initial stages. It was also projected that the program would be covering a small percentage of the US population by its third year (Smith and Ory n.p.). More specifically, it was argued that the program would only cover those people with the ability to purchase their own covers. Furthermore, the program would also be available to firms with less number of employees.

However, the conclusion that the public option health policy is associated with negative effects only should not be made. It is argued that the policy would attract close to more than twenty point six million people if it was amended to open for all people. The private sector is currently dominating the health insurance industry. If the public option health policy is amended, it will host more people than the private sector.

The public option policy is significantly different from the single payer model. The most evident difference between the two is that the single payer policy is a proposition that would see the whole health industry have the government provide the health insurance (Berenson, Holahan and Zuckerman 3). The government would directly limit the operations of the private insurance companies to the extent of pushing them out of the industry. Furthermore, it would be the sole provider of healthcare insurance. Doctors and healthcare centers would operate on their own, and the government would receive all the income from the public through a nationalized health insurance system.

Unlike the public option healthcare that has gained popularity and attention from the Senate, the single-payer policy’s proponents argue that they have been rejected and assumed by the authority, also claiming that the success of the policy has been limited by this rejection from the two houses. Secondly, they argue that public option does not consider the interest of the public, but still continues to receive the attention of the Senate.

No single health alliance has shown interest in supporting the public option healthcare policy. However, the single-payer model has received support from the National Alliance for Democracy, which has continuously expressed its favor for the single payer policy over the public option. One of the most common arguments given by the advocates of the policy is that public option is only an idea. They add that this policy is a fluid idea that requires more research compared to the single payer, also arguing that the single payer policy is ready for application, and the merits expected from the policy are massive.

The single payer policy is also receiving more attention and support since it intends to remove all the costs incurred in healthcare together with all the other deductibles and copayments associated with healthcare. Such finances are only transferred from public to private insurance firms in public option based on the fact that patients will still be required to acquire private insurance despite them having the public insurance policies.

Both options have the main objective of reducing the amount of cost incurred when acquiring healthcare. However, the single payer model is expected to save more finances than the public option policy. For instance, the former strategy is expected to save up to three hundred and fifty billion dollars compared to the latter model, the value of which is much lower. Public option policy is expected to combine both the public and the private insurance, which would increase the expenditure of controlling and maintenance of these two entities (Robertson). Such outcome would imply that the government would be spending in areas that do not impact patients’ health, which shows that the single payer would be saving more on costs compared to the public option. The single option model saves on the elimination of administrative costs. The policy’s reduced costs are channeled to other areas of improvement of the quality of healthcare.

In conclusion, it is evident that single payer and public option models are both intended to improve the quality of healthcare in the United States. The two policies are aimed at either changing the current government-sponsored programs or introducing the new ones. Therefore, it is important to ensure that a comprehensive analysis is carried out to establish which policy best suits the people. In addition to that, all stakeholders should be involved in coming up with a mutually favorable program, which would reduce the amount of time and resources used to come up with policies only to be rejected during the implementation stages. The people involved in the formulation of the two policies should come together and form a one comprehensive strategy, which would solve all the weaknesses of the two models. Besides, both approaches are aimed at achieving the same objective of improving the quality of healthcare to all people.

Works Cited

Blanchet, Nathan J., and Ashley M. Fox. “Prospective political analysis for policy design: enhancing the political viability of single-payer health reform in Vermont.” Health Policy 111.1 (2013): 78-85.

Berenson, Holahan and Zuckerman. Getting to a public option that contains costs: negotiations, opt-outs and triggers. Health Policy Center, 2009. Retrieved from https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/30756/411984-Getting-to-a-Public-Option-that-Contains-Costs-Negotiations-Opt-Outs-and-Triggers.PDF

Chaufan, Claudia. “What can US single-payer supporters learn from the Swiss rejection of single payer?” International Journal of Health Services 46.2 (2016): 331-345.

Dave, Dhaval. “Health care: multi-payer or single-payer?.” Eastern Economic Journal 43.1 (2016): 180-182.

Felder, Tisha Moniek et al. Exploring the use of pharmac[Uetial] patient assistance programs as an option to improve access to and affordability of prescription drugs. 2010. Print.

McDonough, J. E. “Questions for new single-payer advocates.” The Milbank Quarterly 95.4 (2017): 702-705.

Merino, Noël. Health Care. Detroit, MI: Greenhaven Press, 2011. Print.

Robertson, Lori. “Public option vs. single payer” FactCheck.org. N.p., 2009. Web. 18 Dec. 2017. Available at http://www.factcheck.org/2009/12/public-option-vs-single-payer/

Smith, Matthew Lee, and Marcia G. Ory. “Measuring success: evaluation article types for the public health education and promotion section of frontiers in public health.” Frontiers in Public Health 2, 2014: n.p.

Yu, Jia, and Yi Zhang. “Comparison of single-payer and non single-payer health care systems: a study of health administration efficiency.” Modern Economy 08.06 (2017): 816-833.