The Detriments Of The Affordable Care Act

Submitted By tobiasrl
Words: 2718
Pages: 11

The Detriments of the Affordable Care Act

The Detriments of the Affordable Care Act
It can be argued that there is no field as deeply opinionated as the political field. With the mass population’s well-being at stake there is always passion driving the debate. Where passions lie opinions become heated, and for someone who cares deeply on a subject it can be hard to compromise. Throughout the history of the United States, the US government has continuously tried to reform health care through various means. While most of these reforms were failures, they laid the ground work for reform that is going on today. Until the Affordable Care Act, a law that was set in place by the Obama administration with hopes of providing low cost health care to American Citizens with the specific feature that those previously unable to get insurance would now be able to get coverage, health care coverage has thus far been a privately held industry. Reasoning for the switch to a government controlled industry is said to be that it works to provide a large percentage of the population, those who previously could not afford health care coverage, with affordable, accessible coverage. Though the Affordable Care Act is withstanding, there are many examples of failed attempts. The individual mandate proposed, the states reaction to Medicaid expansion, and the changeover process are the main topics of controversy surrounding the health care reform known as the Affordable Care Act. In the interest of satisfying a larger number of citizens, not just the people who benefit, compromises must be made. Things that should be improved regarding the Affordable Care Act are the program for Medicaid, the maintenance of the enrollment portals, and finally, providing better information regarding available health care networks for individuals.
As history shows us, passing health care reform is not a simple task. One example of a failed attempt to standardize health care coverage is from 1917 as the US dealt with World War I. The government issued propaganda against the German privately held insurance companies in order to gain support for government regulated health care (Palmer, 1999). However, people who opposed the idea buried it using anti-communist remarks and insinuating that government run health care would not be democracy (Palmer, 1999). Today, the Affordable Care Act is a topic that generates a lot of debate and passion. Some US citizens are for the Affordable Care Act while others oppose it vehemently, for various reasons, and work to see it abolished completely. While most American citizens view the Affordable Care Act in a less favorable light, there is an estimated 18 million people who could benefit from it (Doherty, 2014). This fact makes it unlikely that the Affordable Care Act will be thrown out entirely. Those who still oppose the health care reform bill suggest it is unfair to charge healthy young people to pay for insurance they may not need. While the Supreme Court upheld the bill as a constitutional law, the issue lies with the young buying into the notion (Brown, 2014). Though there is a small penalty for not signing up for health care, young citizens may consider it less than the cost of buying healthcare coverage. When only the older population is buying health care coverage, and using it, the cost of coverage will raise because there aren’t as many people not using it. President Franklin D. Roosevelt ran into some of the same issues during his second and final attempt at national health care; the Wagner Bill, National Health Act of 1939 (Palmer, 1999). The National Health Care Act of 1939 saw issues with a push back to conservative nature and any social policy reform from then on out was tough to achieve (Palmer, 1999). Another issue for individuals was people who had coverage were reassured their plans would not change if they did not want them to. This was not the case. Millions of Americans with existing policies had them