Nursing-Home Care in the United States

Abstract

Caring for the severely impaired elderly is a social problem of serious and growing proportions. This article describes and analyzes nursing-home care in the United States with particular emphasis on economic aspects and their implications for public policy. Two questions will be addressed. First of all, how do market forces and government regulations interact to affect the critical variables of supply, demand, price, access, and quality of nursing-home services? Secondly, what effect will the federal government's recent actions to reduce its contributions to Medicaid have on the already difficult problems of access and quality in nursing-home care?Restrained SupplyDuring . . .