In the final video in a series on health care affordability, Arnold Ventures explores solutions for addressing the excessive prices paid to health care providers that ultimately drive higher health care costs for consumers, employers, and taxpayers.
Health care has become increasingly unaffordable for everyday Americans, including individuals and families with private insurance. A major driver? The high and rising prices charged by large, dominant health systems as health care markets become increasingly uncompetitive.
SEE VIDEO 1: Health Care Prices Are Out of Control
For decades, large hospital systems have gobbled up smaller hospitals and physician practices, giving them market power to charge abusively high prices. The result is higher health care costs without improvements in the quality of care. After hospitals engage in mergers and acquisitions, prices for families, employers, and taxpayers rise 20 – 30%, studies show.
SEE VIDEO 2: Health Care is Not a Functioning Market
This kitchen table issue impacts us all.
Consider:
- Forty percent of U.S. adults say they have delayed or gone without medical care due to cost.
- More than 100 million Americans have medical debt, and some face predatory billing practices such as wage garnishment.
SEE VIDEO 3: ‘Less Money in our Wallets and Deeper in Debt’
The good news? We can lower health care prices.
AV’s new video highlights a comprehensive set of policy solutions that would address high provider prices. The time is now for policymakers to make health care more affordable for all Americans. A recent survey shows a majority of voters think it is important for Congress to take actions that will lower health care prices. Voters from across the political spectrum support a range of policies to lower prices, including 78% who support aggressive action like direct limits on the prices that hospitals can charge. Large majorities of voters also support policies to improve health care competition and price transparency.
‘We CAN Lower Health Care Prices’
The U.S. has more expensive health care than in any other country in the world, and health care prices are rising. Evidence suggests large hospital monopolies are a big part of the pricing problem. In the final video in a series on health care affordability, Arnold Ventures explores solutions for addressing the excessive prices paid to health care providers that ultimately drive higher health care costs for consumers, employers, and taxpayers.
