Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospital prices

Re:Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospit... by ramraj07 on Tuesday September 06, 2022 @08:48PM (#32745067)

Data doesn’t make sense. If US costs went up similar to other countries but US is significantly more expensive than other countries today, does it mean costs in US have always been much higher?

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Re:Health insurers just published close to a trillion hospit... by tzs on Tuesday September 06, 2022 @09:59PM (#32745543)

Yes (at least as far back as the data at oecd.org goes, which is 1970).

In 1970 US health care spending was $327.0/per capita. France was $192.1, and UK was $124.0. That's 1.7x France and 2.6x UK for the US.

In 2020 it was $11859 for the US, $5468 for France, and $5019 for the UK. That puts 2020 US spending at 2.2x France and 2.4x UK.

From 1970 to 2020 US went up 36x, France 28x, and UK 40x.

It looks like much of the first world has a serious rising health spending problem, with costs rising roughly the same over time everywhere. The US was more expensive long ago, and since the rising costs have been roughly the same the US has stayed more expensive by about the same ratio.

If we could get our spending down to match the rest of the first world, without reducing the level of care, that would be great.

BTW, it is similar if we go by percent of GDP instead of per capita.

US was spending 6.2% of GDP on health in 1970, France 5.2%, and UK 4.0%.

In 2020 that was 18.8% of GDP for the US, 12.2% France, and 12.0% UK.

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