Social Determinants As Public Goods: A New Approach To Financing Key Investments In Healthy Communities

Good research evidence exists to suggest that social determinants of health, including access to housing, nutrition, and transportation, can influence health outcomes and health care use for vulnerable populations. Yet adequate, sustainable financing for interventions that improve social determinant...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inHealth Affairs Vol. 37; no. 8; pp. 1223 - 1230
Main Authors Nichols, Len M, Taylor, Lauren A
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States The People to People Health Foundation, Inc., Project HOPE 01.08.2018
Subjects
Access
Case management
Clinical outcomes
Collaborative approach
Communities
Cost control
Cost estimates
Cost reduction
Economic analysis
Economic models
Financial Support
Financing
Health care expenditures
Health care policy
Health disparities
Health services
Health status
Homeless people
Housing
Interest groups
Intervention
Investments
Low income groups
Medicare
Nonprofit hospitals
Nonprofit organizations
Nutrition
Public finance
Public good
Public goods
Public health
Public Health - economics
Return on investment
Self interest
Social Determinants of Health - economics
Social factors
Social services
Tax reform
Taxation
Transportation
Transportation services
Uninsured people
Vulnerability
United States > US
Health Economics
Financing Health Care
Determinants Of Health
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Summary:Good research evidence exists to suggest that social determinants of health, including access to housing, nutrition, and transportation, can influence health outcomes and health care use for vulnerable populations. Yet adequate, sustainable financing for interventions that improve social determinants of health has eluded most if not all US communities. This article argues that underinvestment in social determinants of health stems from the fact that such investments are in effect public goods, and thus benefits cannot be efficiently limited to those who pay for them-which makes it more difficult to capture return on investment. Drawing on lesser-known economic models and available data, we show how a properly governed, collaborative approach to financing could enable self-interested health stakeholders to earn a financial return on and sustain their social determinants investments.
ISSN:0278-2715
1544-5208
DOI:10.1377/hlthaff.2018.0039