Comparison of Single-Payer and Non Single-Payer Health Care Systems: A Study of Health Administration Efficiency
- 1 Christopher Newport University, Newport News, USA
- 2 Discover Financial Services, Phoenix, USA
Abstract
The United States spends nearly twice as much per capita on health care as several OECD countries. Based on previous research, universal health care decreases the total health care expenditure due to the single-payer system; it is still unknown whether a mixed health care system has superiority. In this study, we compare and evaluate both quality of care and administrative costs among six developed countries, upon three groups: single-payer universal health care system (Australia and Canada), two-tier health care system (France and Japan), and insurance mandate health care system (Switzerland and the US). The results show that both single-payer system and two-tier system are superior to insurance mandate system on health insurance administration costs. Also, regarding insurance mandate system, the healthcare system in Switzerland is more efficient than that in the US. So, we conclude that it is possible for the US to choose a diverse healthcare system, instead of focusing on one system, to trim the healthcare administration cost and improve the quality of care for the entire country.
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