One of the main platforms of President Bill Clinton when he first ran for office was healthcare reform. The 37 million uninsured Americans applauded his planned reforms loudly as President Clinton introduced his daunting healthcare reform proposal soon after he was elected (Matthews 2000). As history reveals, this proposal was not welcomed with the same open arms that elected President Bill Clinton to office. The much vaunted Healthcare Reform that he promised had failed.
The failure of the Clinton Administration with regard to its Healthcare Reform Program was due to the failure of President Clinton to communicate his vision and the lack of support from the majority groups (Matthews 2000). It did not take long for the plan to fail as even during the discussions in congress the President’s plan was already rejected for being too costly and inefficient. The reforms that President Bill Clinton wanted implemented had an adverse effect as shown in the various states that had implemented the Clinton healthcare plan (Cihak, Williams and Ferrera 1997). The healthcare plan caused increased costs instead of reducing the number of uninsured Americans. It also led to the increase in the number of uninsured Americans.
As mentioned earlier, another of the causes of the failure of the Clinton Healthcare plan was the lack of viable sources of funding. While most agreed that a universal healthcare plan was well suited for the general public, there was no consensus with regard to how it was going to be funded (Cihak, Williams and Ferrera 1997). There was no support from major business groups and trade administrations. Instead, a number of these groups lobbied heavily against the universal healthcare plan of President Clinton (Matthews 2000).
These factors thus ensured that instead of having a universal healthcare plan as originally envisioned by President Clinton what remains is a universal headache for this generation and the next.
References:
Matthews, Merril (2000) Lesson’s From Tennessee’s Failed Healthcare Reform. The Heritage Foundation Leadership for America. Healthcare Issue April 7, 2000
Cihak, Robert M.D., Williams, Bob and Ferrara, Peter (1997) “The Rise and Repeal of the Washington State Health Plan: Lessons for America’s State Legislators,” Heritage Foundation State Backgrounder No. 1121/S, June 11, 1997
