Victor Robert Fuchs (born January 31, 1924) is an American
health economist
Health economics is a branch of economics concerned with issues related to efficiency, effectiveness, value and behavior in the production and consumption of health and healthcare. Health economics is important in determining how to improv ...
.
Career
He is an emeritus professor at
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
. Since 1962, he has been a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and is the co-director of the FRESH-Thinking Project and CASBS at Stanford University. Fuchs was elected to the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
in 1982 and to the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
in 1990. In 1995, he served as president of the
American Economic Association
The American Economic Association (AEA) is a learned society in the field of economics. It publishes several peer-reviewed journals acknowledged in business and academia. There are some 23,000 members.
History and Constitution
The AEA was esta ...
. In 2001, he was recipient of the John R. Commons Award, given by the economics honor society
Omicron Delta Epsilon.
Relative poverty rate
Fuchs is credited with introducing the
relative poverty rate
The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for t ...
, calculated as the fraction of members of a society earning less than 50% of the median income.
Comparison of healthcare in Canada and US
In 1990 Fuchs published a paper together with James S. Hahn, entitled ''How Does Canada Do it? – A comparison of Expenditures for Physicians' Services in the United States and Canada''. It discusses the differences in the Canadian and US healthcare spending patterns and also discusses why healthcare expenditures are so much higher in the United States. Fuchs and Hahn found that the higher US expenditures were entirely based on 234 percent higher fees for services than Canada even though there are more physicians per capita in Canada. That shows that the typical view of Canada saving money by delivering fewer services is false and that the insurance setup, being a
single-payer system
Single-payer healthcare is a type of universal healthcare in which the costs of essential healthcare for all residents are covered by a single public system (hence "single-payer").
Single-payer systems may contract for healthcare services from ...
, is what gives it the edge.
Differences between the United States and Canada on fees, spending, and use are shown. The accentuating difference begins with the disparity in health care coverage. Canada operates under a universal health care system, which covers majority of their residents. On the other hand, the United States operates under a fragmented multi-payer system that fails to provide coverage for many Americans.
Moreover, the lack of correspondence between both countries regarding health care coverage validates part of the narrative reported in the study, which concluded that the US spent more on physicians' services than Canada.
Furthermore, the study also suggests that higher expenditures in the US is a function of many factors including higher wages earned by US physicians, the difference of physicians on demand, billing costs, quality of health care, physicians' workload, and superfluous amenities. Notably, the factors bring to question the underlying differences in health care delivery, and the authors reported more general practitioners in Canada per capita. The limited role of general practitioners in the US compared to Canada may imply that Canadian physicians are "more inclined to recommend additional evaluation and management services."
Published books
* ''Who Shall Live? Health, Economics, and Social Choice'' (1975)
* ''The Future of Health Policy'' (1998)
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fuchs, Victor
1924 births
Living people
Health economists
Columbia University alumni
New York University alumni
Presidents of the American Economic Association
Stanford University faculty
Members of the National Academy of Medicine