Six years after the biggest overhaul of U.S. health care in half a century, the industry is bracing for more change under President-elect Donald Trump, who wants to tear it apart.

As many as 200,000 jobs may be lost in the health-care sector over the next year and employers will slow investment as they wait to see Trump's clear plan for reform, according to Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist for Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. economist Alec Phillips, in a report last week, forecast "somewhat depressed" job growth in the sector, based on other tumultuous periods.

"Businesses hate uncertainty and until there is more flesh on the bones of all these proposals floating around, we think companies will take a pass on investment of any kind — machines, headcount, real estate," Rupkey said.

Complete your profile to continue reading and get FREE access to BenefitsPRO, part of your ALM digital membership.

Your access to unlimited BenefitsPRO content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:

  • Breaking benefits news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
  • Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
  • Critical converage of the property casualty insurance and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, PropertyCasualty360 and ThinkAdvisor
NOT FOR REPRINT

© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.