Could healthcare reform cure the ailing job market? One group is saying “yes.”
In its report New Jobs Through Better Health Care, the Center for American Progress predicts that healthcare reform (if passed as it stands currently) would create 250,000 to 400,000 jobs this decade.
How? According to the report, reform will lower health costs for employers so they’ll be able to spend more on payroll and operations.
The report’s formula says that 120,000 jobs are added for every 10% reduction in health costs.
What will generate that kind of savings? The report claims health reform will spark higher quality, lower cost care — a position that’s challenged by opponents of the reform proposal.
Regardless, the report says reform would:
- reduce the occurrence of, and expenses related to, high-cost illnesses via better coordination of care
- lower the cost of various healthcare services that are more expensive in the U.S. than other developed countries, and
- streamline excessive administrative costs.
Of course healthcare reform is still taking shape and things could change very quickly.
Do you agree with this report? Let us know in the Comments Box below.
