How Policy Changes Can Fix Market Distortions in Healthcare and Improve the Country ’s Debt

The following is a guest article by Zach Markin, Co-Founder and CEO at HTD Health American healthcare is the most dysfunctional industry in our country. Historically, it is the most prolific driver of family bankruptcy, and now it is on its way to bankrupting our country collectively. A major justification for President Biden’s tax hike proposal is to shore up the tenuous finances of Medicare whose trust fund is forecasted to be depleted by 2028. While this is important, such efforts address the symptoms of a dysfunctional industry rather than the root causes. While the near-term liquidity and long-term financial health of critical (and exceedingly popular) programs are important, this theater fails to address the underlying drivers of the crisis and amounts to nothing more than moving money from one of our nation’s collective pockets to another — deckchairs on the Titanic and all that. For decades, healthcare spending has continuously increased both on a per capita basis and as a percentage of GDP. Healthcare is arguably the only industry to have been made less productive by the introduction of technology. With an aging population that has 10,000 people turning 65 every day, this problem will only get worse by the day as baby boomers age into Medicare benefits over the coming decades. Is there something unique that prevents healthcare from functioning like any other industry? Why has the quality of services and goods improved continuously in other industries such as fo...
Source: EMR and HIPAA - Category: Information Technology Authors: Tags: Ambulatory C-Suite Leadership Health IT Company Healthcare IT Hospital - Health System Regulations Revenue Cycle Management AMA Healthcare Barriers Healthcare Costs healthcare industry Healthcare Perverse Incentives HTD Health Me Source Type: blogs