Spending more isn't necessarily a bad thing. If you just look at raw spending numbers, it looks healthcare has gotten much more expensive since ~2010.[0] But if

Spending more isn't necessarily a bad thing. If you just look at raw spending numbers, it looks healthcare has gotten much more expensive since ~2010.[0] But if you look at Healthcare spending as a percentage of GDP, it's been flat over the same period.[1] With that in mind, in what sense is rising spending on healthcare a negative? Isn't this exactly what we'd expect in a functioning market economy -- that folks with more money[2] will spend more money on stuff, including healthcare? For example, when we look at raw spending numbers in any other area (food[3], for example) we also see rising spending in absolute terms. Does this signal a failure of capitalism w/ regards to production and distribution of food? Obviously not. [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/184955/us-national-health-expenditures-per-capita-since-1960/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/184955/us-national-healt... [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/184968/us-health-expenditure-as-percent-of-gdp-since-1960/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/184968/us-health-expendi... [2] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N [3] https://www.statista.com/statistics/237211/average-food-expenditures-of-united-states-households/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/237211/average-food-expe...