After watching the video clip on the vital, life-altering impacts that exercise can have on overall health, my previous opinions were only strengthened. I believe that an agenda promoting and rewarding physical activity would be really beneficial to the country as a whole. As mentioned in the film, simply exercising 30 minutes a day can have major preventative disease impacts. This means that if more people were active, many health issues, heart attacks and high blood pressure for example, would be deterred. This clearly could save taxpayers money. No matter what health reform is instituted and what its agenda includes, by having more active healthy residents, the state of the country can only improve. The improvements in metal health and depression/anxiety could really make a difference as well.
All of this sums to my conclusion that, if I had the power, I would propose a policy agenda in which company’s would be rewarded through tax abatements to install gyms for their employees or to provide programs that standardized exercise. The simple tax abatements would definitely be outweighed by benefits of exercising. I do not think that government should be as involved as to punish people for not exercising, but rewarding businesses and companies that do promote/require exercising employees would be really effective.
Most of the major concerns that I saw over the new health care reform were over administrative functioning of getting the reform started. One of the major concerns I read about was that rather than increase employment for medical professionals; it would require a larger number of administrative staff employees. I don’t see how that could be viewed as a problem. There are plenty of able-minded unemployed individuals who would jump at the opportunity to have an administrative position behind the medical program. With baby-boomers aging, the medical field is currently one of the most in-demand fields and there is no evidence that the health reform would deter this from continuing, it simply says that it may not increase to more of a demand.
Overall, it is disappointing to see that these major proponents to the health care reform don’t really seem to be concerned with the health of our nation’s citizens. It sounds like the economical and administrative portions of the bill seem to be more of a concern than actually improving the quality of life for women men and children all over the nation. Hopefully, these antagonistic views aside, we can work to instill more active healthy lifestyles into our nation.
I really enjoyed your post. It was a little shocking to me how much the health care reform really didn't focus on health at all. Hopefully very soon the argumentative sides can find a compromise and something can be done to assist people here in the U.S. struggling with finding a way to stay healthy.
ReplyDeleteI agree with what you have said about health reform, the citizens should be more active and exercise a few minutes to maintain a healthy life. The businesses should promote more exercising to encourage the citizens.
ReplyDeleteI liked your post and think your idea about implementing a policy in which companies would be compensated by taxes to install gyms and equipment for their employees is very clever. I think that if people were given the benefit of a free gym membership, they would feel more inclined to take advantage of it. I find it shockingly simple that 30 minutes of walking can shave years off of ones life. I also find it very shocking that so many don't get this small amount of exercise daily.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure Google provides a gym (and gourmet meals, childcare, etc) to its employees. And people obviously love working there! Now, not all companies are as large as Google, but I think the idea is really great. Even if they provided emplyess with a break where they could go exercise or discounts at a local gym would be better than what is in place now- nothing!
ReplyDeleteyou have a lot of spirit for the policy viewpoints of healthcare. It is a better mind, body and spirit when just sminor physical activity is worked into daily schedules. I'm not sure punishment for lack of is solid, but what seems fair is that an increase or higher premiums should be placed on the individual or family account.
ReplyDeleteKali great post!
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion health care providers should give incentives to their customers to promote a healthier living, for example, by covering 50% of a gym membership. Perhaps they can encourage their customers to be physically active by providing discounts. For example, if the customer can show that they have been able to keep their cholesterol or wight. In the long run the health care providers would save money by not having to pay medical claims that could have been prevented by physical activity. After all health care providers are about saving money and creating profit.