Investing in Long-Term Health

The growth in spending on health care has slowed over the last decade, easing fears that Medicare would devour the federal budget, create crippling federal deficits, and cause precipitous jumps in tax rates.1 This is good news insofar as it makes room in public and private budgets for other priorities, and is consistent with improving efficiency in health care delivery, such as the move toward substituting outpatient care for hospitalizations. This slowdown in spending, however, could also augur reduced innovation in new technologies, medications, and procedures; lower quality of care and less access to care; and lower life expectancy.