State Level Healthcare Expenses Healthcare Expenditures

STATE HEALTHCARE ANALYSIS

State Healthcare Analysis

When a state makes healthcare expenditures, it is spending to provide better healthcare facilities and opportunities for access. The human capital needs to be strengthened with enhanced productivity, which is only possible with high levels of health for all age groups of the state and country, contributing to the fortification of the entire economy (Raghupati & Raghupati, 2020). The current state of residency, which is New York, is compared to the other two selected states of the US to compare some of the crucial healthcare data.

New York

California

Massachusetts

Total expenditure

Total uninsured adults (age 19-64 years)

Federal Medicaid/Medicare expenditure

Average cost per resident

Access to the healthcare of adults 18 years and above

Explanation of the Chart

One of the key factors to show healthcare system spending is total employer-sponsored insurance reimbursements for physician office services per enrollee, 18-64 years in dollars (Commonwealth Fund.org, 2022). The data is taken for the year 2018 since data for the year 2019 was missing for New York, although it was there for the rest of the two states.

The total number of uninsured adults in the three states has been mentioned in the table, which shows that the lowest rate of uninsured adults is in New York. It is a positive sign against Massachusetts and California, which have high rates of uninsured adults. It could be inferred that New York has better health coverage plans than the rest of the two states. The data is taken for the year 2020 for all states here.

The third row shows the total Medicare reimbursements for inpatient hospitals per enrollee. New York State again ranks highest compared to the rest of the two states since it has higher reimbursements for Medicare plans for the citizens, but Massachusetts and California do not. The data is taken here again for the year 2020 for all three states.

The government could take the average cost per resident as the primary care spending on adults aged 65 years and above for Medicare beneficiaries. The exact data for average cost per resident was not available on the website; therefore, to compare the average spending, this factor was selected for three states. New York has the highest cost of this spending, while Massachusetts has the lowest cost among the three for this attribute. The data is taken for the year 2020 for all three states.

Access to the healthcare of adults 18 years and above is taken as another crucial indicator of healthcare status in New York and the other two states. New York ranks second after Massachusetts and third place in California. The data is taken for the year 2020 for all three states.

Analysis

With a deep analysis of the table and data available for the corresponding factors, California ranks lowest overall since its healthcare spending is low, which results in a high number of people being uninsured, lesser Medicare expenditure, and lowest access to healthcare for adults in comparison with New York and Massachusetts.

The case of Massachusetts is interesting; it spends the highest on healthcare, but the rate of people still uninsured is the highest of all. Research shows many people without health insurance in Massachusetts (Nelson & Rushakoff, 2019). These uninsured persons remain uninsured due to the burden of insurance costs and, thus, low access to healthcare as compared to their neighboring states. According to the demographics of this state, Whites and Hispanics are the most prominent ethnic groups, aging 18-34 years more notably, who have a high uninsured rate in the state (Nelson & Rushakoff, 2019).

For New York, the total healthcare expenditure is just below Massachusetts and has the lowest number of uninsured people within the state. It means that the state has been doing well in providing for its citizens and ensuring that every age group has the access and facilities to take care of themselves in every possible way. Similarly, it stands second to Massachusetts for providing healthcare access to adults aged 18 years and above, which depicts the state’s economy’s fortification. Medicare expenditure is high, which also refers to the fact that it knows how to assure citizens of their health in coverage plans with affordable premiums and deductibles.

Conclusion

Healthcare expenditure is the consumption of a state’s or country’s resources to provide and restore its people’s health for better employment, education, and economic consolidation. The resources consumed in a year are crucial indicators of how well the economy promotes the consumers’ health.

If a state is spending more on its people’s health, it is taking healthcare concerns seriously. It wants its people to make progress; however, it could mean the other way. There could be certain segments of the population, underserved or some with chronic or critical healthcare needs, rising. It could mean that states have to incur more costs to serve those areas of their population. Also, it could be inferred that the population is increasing, and children, adults, and older people need to be insured on a wider scale.