Strange, this neglects that portion of health care spend that is accounted for by profits, by marketing expenses and administrative/billing bloat that ensues.

It also neglects that for its massively higher spend 10% of Americans aren't covered and therefore don't receive preventative care yielding massively higher final costs, and it doesn't take into account the WHO ranks the US system as 31st in the world dramatically under all the socialized players.

[Edit] as I suspected [1] indicates a full 20% of spend is wasted mostly on profits and administrative costs. That should be taken off the top.

IMO this is a case of "figures don't lie, liars figure" but without the malicious intent.

[1] https://www.cms.gov/CCIIO/Resources/Files/Downloads/mlr-repo...

This strikes me as circular logic. "The reason healthcare is expensive is because the US is expensive."

I have no problem with the idea of healthcare expenditures increasing proportionally to GDP because it's a luxury good. This is logical. I'll pay more to protect my life than widgets.

But I don't see the connection between this and the thesis:

>Now, to be clear, my position is not that we ought to be spending as much as we spend. My position is that the issues we face are very similar to the issues faced in Europe and other prosperous countries (and are generally similar to patterns many decades earlier). They are largely differences in degree, not kind. Our large apparent cost differences mostly originate from our significantly higher material standard of living. The long term increases found in the United States and other developed countries are generally a product of ever increasing material living conditions and varying levels of productivity in different economic sectors (healthcare being labor intensive and relatively high skilled at that). Despite the fact that all developed countries allocate a large and increasing share of their consumption expenditures on health care these these richer countries, including the United States, still spend more on other forms of consumption.

That sounds to me like the cost of our healthcare is ultimately up to the market, but that's not a thesis to fight for, as it's always a fact.

By using end result economic data like GPD or AIC to compare healthcare costs the analysis ignores the changing cost of inputs. Those rising costs should be linked to changes in business conditions.

Healthcare costs have been rising faster than inflation. And they have been rising faster than the material standard of living in the US. There are structural problems.

Slightly off topic but is there is a such thing as universal affordable good healthcare?

I've talked to a few U.S. citizens that worked abroad who said healthcare in European countries is universally available but the demand outstrips the supply causing longer wait times to get treated than in the U.S. and that they prefer the U.S. system. These are of course people who have good jobs in the U.S. with company provided coverage. Is that true?

Is there any system that can both cover everyone without making healthcare worse for people who already have good coverage?

(withdrawn)

Is it possible that healthcare in the US is a "superior good" (definition in article) because the lower quartiles can't afford proper care and as they become wealthier they progress from zero care, to basic plans that don't cover nearly what they should, to plans equivalent to the care people receive elsewhere in the world as a right of citizenship?

So his claim that the us has a higher standard of living is based on it having a higher AIC. But does this take into account that countries with higher taxation and hence public expenditure could reduce the need for households to spend money on public goods/services?

Sam Peltzman in "Regulation of Pharmaceutical Innovation" shows how the 1962 FDA regulations have slowed down progress in pharmaceutical development to more than outweigh the improved safety. I.e. it's a net negative.

I have a severe migraine attack, I need narcotic strength pain meds. Only place to get them on short notice is the Emergency room. Takes four hours and I get a bill for $3,000.

This has nothing to do with US being expensive. It's a broken system.

Lmao, bullshit.

I have had quite enough of these constant talks down to ordinary people.

When we do not value our people well enough to find a reasonable standard of living, nearly all of us lose.