Health Insurance and the Affordable Care Act
Assignment 4: Health Insurance and the Affordable Care Act
Due Week 8 and worth 150 points
Suppose you have been tasked with purchasing health insurance for your organization that has fifty full-time employees.
Use the Internet or Strayer databases to research different types of health insurance.
Write a 2-3 page paper in which you:
Suggest one (1) plan that you would use to purchase health insurance for your organization. Determine the extent to which employee lifestyle choices and health economics would factor in to your chosen plan. Provide a rationale for your response.
Analyze the implication of the Affordable Care Act on your decision to purchase insurance. Debate two (2) advantages and two (2) disadvantages of purchasing health insurance for your employees, as opposed to having your employees receive governmental insurance.
Use at least two (2) quality references. Note: Wikipedia and other Websites do not qualify as academic resources.
Your assignment must follow these formatting requirements:
Be typed, double spaced, using Times New Roman font (size 12), with one-inch margins on all sides; citations and references must follow APA or school-specific format. Check with your professor for any additional instructions.
Include a cover page containing the title of the assignment, the student's name, the professor's name, the course title, and the date. The cover page and the reference page are not included in the required assignment page length.
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Healthcare plan
The preferred provider organizations plans (PPOs) provide more flexibility than HMOS, but since employees can choose to stay or go outside the network, they have more alternatives on the choice of physicians based on their lifestyles. Even though, premiums may be higher than HMOs, the cost is typically borne by the participant rather than the employer. In any case, participants choose other alternatives outside the network even in cases they do not seek referrals from the providers (Green, 2012). The coverage in these plans can vary depending on the insurance provider for both in-network and out of network coverage. Employees may prefer the member provider choice since it is less costly than the member provider alternative.
Even though, PPOs have not been the dominant plan unlike HMO, there is less administrative burden associated with the option. Nonetheless, one of the challenges associated with the plans is that there is no certainty on the impact of increased calls for HMO accountability as well as future cost implication. At the moment, PPOs are the best option given that is possible to tailor the workers’ benefits based on the insurance coverage (Green, 2012). In any case, since there has been some skepticism about ObamaCare PPOs are likely to be well accepted by employees as they care much about choice as well as costs. In any case, since PPOs customize benefits based on the health risks of participants and demographic profile, it is likely that preventive care will be crucial in reducing the cost of insurance coverage (Green, 2012).
Affordable Care Act and purchase of insurance
The Affordable Care Act has made it necessary to expand the scope of services that can be covered by a health insurance plan. There is concern, that this may make the PPOs uncompetitive in the future since there is a need to ensure than Essential Health Benefits are well covered under the healthcare insurance plans. In other words, ...