private insurance

Examples of private insurance in the following topics:

• Health Care in the U.S.

  • Healthcare in the United States is provided by separate legal entities, often private facilities with governmental insurance for citizens.
  • Most Americans under age 65 (59.3%) receive their health insurance coverage through an employer (which includes both private, as well as civilian public-sector employers) under group coverage, although this percentage is declining.
  • Healthcare facilities are largely owned and operated by the private sector.
  • The U.S. system is primarily one of private insurance, with governmental insurance provided for citizens on the healthcare fringe.
  • Some Americans who do not qualify for government-provided health insurance are not provided health insurance by an employer, and are unable to afford, cannot qualify for, or choose not to purchase private health insurance.

• Health Insurance

  • Two types of health insurance exist in modern society, private health insurance and publicly funded health insurance.
  • Private insurance, based on free market principles, refers to health insurance provided by a non-governmental organization, usually a privately owned or publicly traded corporation.
  • Among developed nations, the United States is the only country in which private insurance is the primary source of healthcare.
  • In contrast to this private method, in public insurance, health care is paid wholly or mostly by public funds.
  • Discuss the use of both private and public health insurance and the implications for society's overall health

• Paying for Medical Care

  • The insurer may be a private organization or a government agency.
  • Two types of health insurance have developed in modern society: private health insurance (or free-market) models and publicly funded health insurance models.
  • Private insurance refers to health insurance provided by a non-governmental organization, usually a privately owned or publically traded corporation.
  • Despite these possible benefits, the private insurance approach is not without its drawbacks.
  • In private insurance systems, each insurance company is responsible for negotiating its own salaries.

• Income Security Policy and Policy Making

  • That a compulsory government program, not the private market, provides unemployment insurance can be explained using the concepts of adverse selection and moral hazard.
  • Adverse selection causes profit maximizing private insurance agencies to set high premiums for the insurance because there is a high likelihood they will have to make payments to the policyholder.
  • High premiums exclude many individuals who otherwise might purchase the insurance.
  • "At the same time, those workers who managed to obtain insurance might experience more unemployment other than what would have been the case."
  • The private insurance company would have to determine whether the employee is unemployed through no fault of their own, which is difficult to determine.

• Gender Inequality in Health Care

  • More women than men are insured in the United States.
  • In one study of a population group in a low-income urban community, 86 percent of women reported having access to health insurance through publicly assisted or private options, while only 74 percent of men reported having any health insurance at all.
  • Gender discrimination in health care manifests primarily as the amount of money one pays for insurance premiums—the amount paid per month in order to be covered by insurance.
  • This is largely due to regulations of private insurance companies.
  • Fewer than ten state governments prohibit gender discrimination in insurance premiums.

• Health Care Reform

  • The issue of health insurance reform in the United States has been the subject of political debate since the early part of the 20th century.
  • Barack Obama called for universal health care and the creation of a National Health Insurance Exchange that would include both private insurance plans and a Medicare-like government run option.
  • Obama's plan required that parents cover their children, but did not require that adults buy insurance.
  • The system preserves private insurance and private health care providers and provides more subsidies to enable the poor to buy insurance.
  • Most people will be required to obtain health insurance or pay a tax.

• The Role of Government

  • This distinguishes it from other forms of private medical insurance.
  • In the private model, the rights of access are subject to contractual obligations between an insurer and an insurance company.
  • Publicly funded healthcare systems are usually financed in one of two ways: through taxation or via compulsory national health insurance.
  • In compulsory insurance models, healthcare is financed from some combination of employees' salary deductions, employers' contributions, and possibly additional state funds.
  • However, introducing improved incentives through a more competitive environment among providers and insurers has proved difficult.

• The Affordable Care Act

  • Its goals were to provide all Americans with access to affordable health insurance, to require that everyone in the United States acquire some form of health insurance, and to lower the costs of healthcare.
  • The plan, which made use of government funding, created private insurance company exchanges to market various insurance packages to enrollees.
  • His proposal was to spend $900 billion over 10 years and include a government insurance plan, also known as the public option, to compete with the corporate insurance sector as a main component to lowering costs and improving quality of health care.
  • The plan also includes medical spending cuts and taxes on insurance companies that offer expensive plans.
  • There is also a tax penalty for those who do not obtain health insurance, unless they are exempt due to low income or other reasons.

• Health Care Policy

  • Health care facilities are largely owned and operated by private sector businesses.
  • Most of the population under 65 is insured by his/her or a family member's employer, some buy health insurance on their own, and the remainder are uninsured.
  • The United States, as a matter of oft-stated public policy, largely does not regulate prices of services from private providers, assuming the private sector could do it better.
  • It mandates that all residents who can afford to purchase health insurance must do so, and it provides subsidized insurance plans so that nearly everyone can afford health insurance.
  • Both of these systems have private insurers to choose from, but the government is the dominant purchaser.

• Current Issues in Health Care

  • Most Americans with private health insurance have it provided by their employers.
  • The insurers negotiate rates with hospitals for different procedures.
  • This results in insurers refusing to insure these patients.
  • The ACA will only work if both healthy and sick people alike buy insurance: if the healthy choose to pay the fine for not having insurance and only the sick buy insurance, then costs will increase.
  • Some feel that the government should not mandate that private citizens purchase insurance in the first place.