WASHINGTON — Healthcare spending in the United States will nearly double over the next decade to $4.1 trillion in 2016, government economists said today, prompting concern that Americans cannot keep paying for cost increases that outstrip the growth of the economy.
The healthcare bill will average $12,782 for every man, woman and child in 2016, an increase from $7,498 this year, said the report, published online by the policy journal Health Affairs. Healthcare costs will account for nearly 20 cents out of every dollar Americans spend in 2016, up from about 16 cents today.
And by 2016 -- even before most baby boomers retire and become Medicare recipients -- federal, state and local government will be picking up nearly half the national healthcare tab, putting pressure on Congress to curb benefits, raise taxes or both.
"This is really the key issue for the fiscal future of the nation," said Robert L. Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition, a private group that promotes reducing the federal deficit. "If healthcare costs continue to drift up -- unless you dramatically raise taxes -- you will have healthcare pushing out everything else government does. Nobody can say exactly when you reach a point that it's unsustainable, but you can look at something and say it's unlikely."
The report by the government's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services follows a recent private study concluding that the United States spends far more on healthcare than other advanced countries, with no measurably better result.
Even after adjusting for greater disposable income here, the report by the McKinsey Global Institute, a private economic think tank, found that costs in the U.S. were $1,645 per person higher than in countries such as the United Kingdom and Germany. It attributed the excess costs to higher administrative expenses, drug prices, doctors' incomes and other factors.
"Most components of the U.S. healthcare system are economically distorted," the report said, adding that "no single factor is ... the silver bullet for reform."
The new federal cost report, prepared by government statisticians, deliberately steered clear of policy recommendations. But its authors warned of a growing possibility "that we will have to make important sacrifices to pay for healthcare" and a need for "constant assessment of the value we associate with our healthcare investment."
