
The killing of a health insurance executive in New York City prompted a furious outpouring of anger over the industry and healthcare prices. So just how much have healthcare costs and spending been going up?
The short answer: a lot. National healthcare spending increased 7.5% year over year in 2023 to $4.867 trillion, or $14,570 per person, according to data released Wednesday by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Total spending on healthcare goods and services, everything from prescription drugs to back surgeries, accounted for 17.6% of gross domestic product, a measure of goods and services produced by the U.S. economy.
The 7.5% rise represented a much faster pace of growth than the 4.6% increase in 2022. It came as pandemic federal funding for the healthcare sector expired and private health insurance enrollment increased. More people with insurance led to increased demand for medical procedures, and spending on hospital care grew at the fastest pace since 1990. Spending on drugs also rose, including for medications to treat diabetes and obesity.
A full 92.5% of Americans were covered by insurance last year, and 175.6 million, or just over half the population, got it through their employer, according to the government’s new annual data.
Over 65 million Americans are on Medicare, a government health-insurance program mainly for people ages 65 and older, and nearly 92 million are on Medicaid, a state-federal program for the low-income and disabled.
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