US health care spending in 2022

It appears that health care spending as a share of GDP has leveled off. While reaching close to 20% of GDP during the pandemic, 2022 had health care spending (17.3% of GDP) more in line with pre-pandemic norms. Hartman et al. (2023) reports: Health care spending in the US grew 4.1 percent to reach $4.5 trillion in…

20% of US GDP to be spent on health care

That is the conclusion from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services National Health Expenditure Projections. The paper–published in Health Affairs—summarizes the spending changes as follows: National health expenditures are projected to grow 5.4 percent, on average, over the course of 2022–31 and to account for roughly 20 percent of the economy by the end of that…

2021 US National Health Expenditures

A paper in Health Affairs by Martin, Hartman, Benson, Catlin, and The National Health Expenditure Accounts Team (2022) finds that national health expenditures (NHE) rose but declined as a share of gross domestic product (GDP). Health care spending in the US grew 2.7 percent to reach $4.3 trillion in 2021, a much slower rate than the increase…

MEPS vs. NHEA

Many researchers use household data sources to examine a variety of hypothesis.  The use of household data has many benefits including allowing for more detailed socioeconomic information (e.g., education, income) beyond what is contained in administrative claims files.  One drawback of household data is that extrapolations made from household survey data may not match national…

Health Spending Climbs to 16.2% of GDP

From the CMS Office of the Actuary: U.S. health care spending growth decelerated in 2008, increasing 4.4 percent compared to 6.0 percent in 2007, as spending growth slowed for nearly all health care goods and services, particularly for hospitals. Health spending growth for state and local and private sources of funds also slowed while federal…