Increasing Accessibility to Health Care through Government Reforms: The History, Politics and Policies of Health Care Reform in the United States

The following collection explores whether government health care reform laws can increase the accessibility of health care to all Americans. The following also explores the fundamental question of whether health care should be a right or a privilege in the United States. The history of health care reform efforts and what influences the American public regarding health care reform is addressed through exploring American Individualism, a decline in social capital and political polarization in the United States. Through a qualitative review of peer-reviewed articles and secondary sources, and a quantitative review of health care data and statistics, the Affordable Care Act of 2010 and Massachusetts health care law, Chapter 58 of the Acts of 2006 are hypothesized to be capable of gradually increasing accessibility of health care through incrementalism, which proves to be a pragmatic and effective policy making method for a social policy issue such as health care reform.