Politics and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
Regardless of political affiliation, individuals often grow concerned when considering perceived competing interests of government and their impact on topics of interest to them. The realm of healthcare is no different. Some people feel that local, state, and federal policies and legislation can be either helped or hindered by interests other than the benefit to society.
Consider for example that the number one job of a legislator is to be reelected. Cost can be measured in votes as well as dollars. Thus, it is important to consider the legislator’s perspective on either promoting or not promoting a certain initiative in the political landscape.
To Prepare:
Review the Resources and reflect on efforts to repeal/replace the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
Consider who benefits the most when policy is developed and in the context of policy implementation.
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Politics and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
Shaping the healthcare industry has seen competition between political ideologies and affiliations. Efforts to counter the affordable care act have been a subject of political debate in the US with the primary objective being to garner voter support. Sometimes the political debate has been known to sway interests in an effort to change public opinion while gaining political mileage. In some cases, policy developed marred with political interest can see the primary focus on the political mileage over the societal benefit/cost of the legislation. This paper evaluates the beneficially of policy development in the context of policy implementation and in reference to Affordable Care Act policy.
Health has become one of the hot topics during campaigns in the US, with every side presetting their desired implementation to change and impact the Americans welfare. While the primary objective of a legislator is to be re-elected, the cost/benefit factor of a policy plays an equally key role in one’s effort to repel, amend or replace a policy such as the affordable care act (ACA). According to Reny & Sears (2020), the development and enactment of ACA as a healthcare law in the country was beneficial in the aspect that, the cost of care reduced, increased accessibility with a higher number of people managing to secure insurance. As legislator seeks re-election, they equally think on how they can make good policies positively impacting the people’s lives. While they (legislators) have their ideas on how to amend and or improve policies and overall healthcare system, the ideal approach would be utilizing statistics to make informed decision. The approach would allow factor in the number of people benefiting from the ACA policy as well as cost benefits. People’s voice is a strong factor that can hardly be ignored when making decisions impacting their welfare.
With reference to who benefits most when policy is developed, the straight forward response should be the American people. Despite this, factors such as political influences may lead to promoting or not promoting a given policy process (Berkeley & Khari, 2021). The debate in support or against the ACA policy saw democrats as the proponents and republicans as the opponents’ Republican Party. Political affiliation may affect legislators’ positioning with reference to national policies. The benefit cost analysis and claims should take precedent in legislators’ decision making with reference to how they improve people’s lives in policy making and implementation. However, political loyalties have linked with replacing and repel against the Affordable Care Act. Political interests and loyalties of the legislators has been indispensable in their decision making process where they may end up voting against peoples will/benefit, but rather be guided by their re-election ambitions.
Policy development and implementation are done for reasons; hence the primary reason should be to improve people’s welfare, rather than seeking one’s personal gain in politics. For the case of ACA healthcare policy, decisions to repel it can result to increasing the out of pocket cost in healthcare funding as well as increased number of uninsured people and reduced care accessibility hence crippling the current state of healthcare in the country (Hudson et al., 2019). The politicians’ efforts to influence decision making such as the congress undermines the effective and independent approach in policy formulation. Healthcare related discussion are polarizing in the US, and while many argue that healthcare should be universal, determining how to fund the sector brings in the quagmire. Legislators participating in elections view it as gaining mandate by the large population to their agenda completed.
References
Berkeley, F., N, M. A., & Khari, B. R. (2021). Opposition to the affordable care act has little to do with health care. Race and Social Problems, 13(2), 161-169. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-020-09306-z
Hudson, B., Hunter, D., & Peckham, S. (2019). Policy failure and the policy-implementation gap: can policy support programs help? Policy Design and Practice, 2(1), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/25741292.2018.1540378
Reny, T. T., & Sears, D. O. (2020). Symbolic politics and self-interest in post-affordable care act health insurance coverage. Research & Politics, 7(3)https://doi.org/10.1177/2053168020955108