Health Care Inadequacies as a threat to the US Economy
There are a number of threats to the US economy and one of the more underrated ones is the health care system. While everybody focuses on things like inflation or taxes as threats to the economy the real threats are actually the things that people aren't focusing on. Health care is definitely one of these. The health care inadequacies are a very serious threat to the US economy and deserve far more attention than has been focused on them.
The main way in which health care inadequacies are a threat to the US economy is that it adds to the cost of doing business. In most other countries the majority of the cost of health care is covered by the government which means that companies don't need to pay for health insurance for their employees. This isn't the case in the United States where for the most part health insurance is part of the cost of hiring an employee. With the massive increase in the cost of health care this is a major expense for businesses. Having to pay this extra expense makes American companies less competitive in the global economy since their cost for each employee is much higher.
Because the high cost of health care is making American companies uncompetitive in the global marketplace a number of them have decided to stop offering health insurance. While this helps the particular company out it doesn't really change the threat to the US economy. The problem is that all of those people who used to get their health insurance from their employer are now having to pay for it themselves. This leaves them with less money to spend on other things. In large part the American economy is driven by consumers. In order to keep the economy strong it is necessary to have people out there buying new products. When people have to pay for their own health insurance the amount that they can spend on other things is reduced and that lowers the number of sales that American companies can make.
Another way that health care inadequacies are a threat to the US economy is that it reduces the productivity of the American worker. When people don't have proper health care they tend to be sick more often and that results in them missing more work. The main problem is the lack of primary care. The American health care system is set up to cure disease but does a very poor job of preventing it. With a for profit health care system the health care providers have figured out that they can make more money curing illness than they can preventing it. For the good of the economy it would be much better if more effort were put into keeping people healthy rather than trying to cure them after they get ill.