Discussion: The parties that are the most important stakeholders in America's healthcare industry are; the consumers of the American public; medical industry corporations such as insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies and managed care firms; publicly provided healthcare programs or facilities; and the United States government as a whole. The current reality in the medical industry is that while the government and the corporations are sharing the profits of this situation, the medical consumers and the publicly funded, free medical programs are losing out. Public health is the entity with the lowest level of representation in American healthcare, with costs of healthcare not just making healthcare unaffordable for a large percentage of the population, but at the same time making up about 15% of the national GDP as a result of the same cost issues. (NCHC, 2004, p. 1) This shows that the high costs of healthcare are not because it is getting too expensive for the average American to afford. Instead, it is because insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies are trying to get more profit from the American people. Truly, this points to biggest stakeholder in the current state of American healthcare. While the U.S. economy has experienced a continuing downturn in its rate of growth between 2000 and today, the healthcare industry has grown. .
On the power of employer provided healthcare premiums which rose by 9.2% during that period, the healthcare industry experienced an economic trend which sharply juxtaposed a rate of inflation one-third of this rise. This would prove a far stronger rate of growth than in such typically robust sectors as technology and retail. (NCHC, 2004, p. 1) This would contrast the continually slow growth of the overall economy. Accordingly, Levit et al (2001) would indicate show that a 'sluggish' economy would allow for healthcare to rise prodigiously as a contributor to America's overall GDP.
