Are health care costs really slowing down?
Sarah Kliff writes:
The New England Journal of Medicine published a paper this week titled “When the Cost Curve Bent,” where researchers from the Center for Sustainable Health Costs suggest that the slowdown happened way before the recession. Their analysis shows — and you can see it in this chart — that excess health-care spending growth (any spending above and beyond potential gross domestic product) began to moderate in the early 2000s:
“Too soon to say” is a fair enough response, but this has become increasingly my view over the last year.
Addendum: Angus comments.