Health Care Policy in the United States.

Health care is certainly one of the most discussed and debated public policy issues facing the nation today. This is evident in the prolific writings on this subject in academia and the print media. However, many of the books on health care tend to address specific and specialized topics, resulting in a paucity of literature providing a general and broad overview of the U.S. health care system. Professor Mueller's book is a welcome addition in filling this gap.

His book examines how the national government, through its policies, has attempted to address three of the most important values in the U.S. health care system--access to care, quality of care, and the high cost of care, i.e., cost containment. The first two chapters of the book discuss the politics of health care and the political environment within which policies are developed. Mueller identifies four distinct policy periods: From 1900-1960 the national government's policies tended to emphasize the theme of quality care. The second period, 1961-1972, was …