Health Care Training

FROM DANIEL:

The Washington Post reported the Obama administration’s pledge to fund training for health care professionals across the country. Citing a projected doctor shortage of over 130,000 by 2025, Obama’s team announced a $1 billion stimulus program for the health care sector.

The article noted:

The need for a larger health-care workforce will probably become particularly acute in 2014, when the health-care overhaul is expected to expand health insurance coverage to millions of Americans. By 2019, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projects, 32 million more Americans will have gained health insurance coverage.

The new program, however, stirs controversy. In addition to opposition from Conservatives demanding budget cuts, as Peters notes in Chapter 11, “the regulation of quality is one of the most controversial areas of government intervention in the health care field.” (284) Most of the public believes that only physicians can train and judge other medical professionals. While the Obama plan issues grants to such physicians in order to train the next generation of health care professionals, the federal government clearly expands its regulation of health care by determining which firms and organizations receive new or increased funding. The Obama plan furthers federal regulation of health care, which Peters says can add fuel to an already-raging partisan dispute over health care.

I worked on an article for the Rose Institute this year covering the progress of a new Medical School at UC Riverside. Some interesting facts I learned in the process: 40% of physicians practice in the city they are trained; primary care physicians that move into high need areas create 23 new jobs; California pledged $15 million per year to the school’s construction, but such funding has been cut altogether.

The Riverside case highlights the impact Obama’s plan can have on unemployment and how important the specifics of the plan will be. If training dollars go mostly to primary care, and Obama can implement significant training programs within a year, he can significantly reduce the unemployment rate before the 2012 election.