Journal Article

Mandatory and affordable health insurance

Abstract: This paper asserts that America's health care system is broken and cannot be repaired with timid half-measures. It suggests that we need both universal coverage and a more efficient delivery system and that these are not competing objectives: Each is necessary to make the other possible. It further states that if we do not make health care more affordable and our delivery system more efficient and sustainable, a majority of Americans will be uninsured in short order. And the persistence of millions of uninsured impairs the efficiency we need to make health care and insurance affordable for all. Thus, contrary to conventional wisdom, this paper asserts that both universal coverage and delivery system reform must be pursued simultaneously.

Keywords: Medical care; Insurance, Health;

Status: Published in Selected papers of a conference co-hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis; the Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government, and Public Policy at Washington University in St. Louis; the Center for Health Policy at Washington University in St. Louis; and the Missouri Foundation for Health - June 8, 2007

Bibliographic Information

Provider: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

Part of Series: Regional Economic Development

Publication Date: 2007

Issue: Oct

Pages: 24-28