Healthcare in the Netherlands
A 2008 article in the journal "Health Affairs" suggested that the Dutch health system, which combines mandatory universal coverage with competing private health plans, could serve as a model for reform in the US. However,
an assessment of the 2006 Dutch health insurance reforms published in Duke University's "Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law" in 2008 raised concerns. The analysis found that market-based competition in healthcare may not have the advantages over more publicly based single payer models that were originally envisioned for the reforms:
Netherlands
The Netherlands was the third country in the world to have representative government and has been a parliamentary constitutional monarchy with a unitary structure since 1848. Historically, the country has a tradition of pillarisation and a long record of social tolerance, having legalised abortion, prostitution and euthanasia, while maintaining a progressive drug policy. The Netherlands abolished the death penalty in 1870, allowed women's suffrage in 1917 and became the world's first country to legalise same-sex marriage in 2001. It is a founding member of the EU, Eurozone, G10, NATO, OECD and WTO, as well as a part of the Schengen Area and the trilateral Benelux Union. It hosts several intergovernmental organisations and international courts, many of which are centered in The Hague, which is consequently dubbed 'the world's legal capital.' Its mixed-market advanced economy had the thirteenth-highest per capita income globally. One of the world's most prosperous countries, the Netherlands ranks among the highest in international indexes of press freedom, economic freedom, human development, quality of life, as well as happiness. Its strong performance is owed in large part to a generous welfare state that provides universal healthcare, public education and infrastructure, in addition to social benefits. It is also known for its polder model, the country's leading socioeconomic model based on consensus decision-making.