American Consumers Continue to Carry the Burden of Rising Health Care Costs

In a Commonwealth Fund–supported study in the January/February 2008 issue of Health Affairs, researchers at the Center for Studying Health System Change and the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found that rising health care costs, a slowed economy, and stagnant incomes created greater financial burdens for U.S. families. The study found that in 2004 one in six Americans lived in families that spent more than 10 percent of their after-tax income on health care—approximately 18 percent of the nonelderly population, up from 16 percent in 2001. This means that consumers will continue to struggle to pay medical bills and subsequently incur medical debt that could begin to affect other areas of their lives. Some may even forgo necessary care as costs skyrocket and employers and private insurance companies continue to shift costs and provide inadequate coverage.

In the first part of this decade, health care costs began to grow faster than inflation. Employers shifted more of their expenses to workers through a combination of higher premiums, deductibles, and co-payments. Families strapped with this added burden of health care faced another problem—economic pressures due to slowed income growth. Poverty rates increased, and the ranks of the uninsured swelled. Today approximately 47 million people live without insurance in the United States.

According to this informative report, the rising cost of health care is no longer just a problem for people living in poverty. Although poor and low-income people face a greater prevalence of high financial burdens, middle-income families are also at risk of becoming the next group of consumers to struggle with medical expenses and insubstantial coverage.

To learn more about the effects rising health care costs on middle and lower income consumers, as well as those receiving private versus public coverage, visit please visit: http://www.commonwealthfund.org/.