Understanding Economic Equilibrium

CHAPTER 22

Health Care Costs: A Steady Climb

The life expectancy of a U.S. citizen in 2020 was nearly 79 years, about 11 years longer than in 1950. The shorter life spans of past decades were at least partially due to behavior: adults smoked, ate more salty, sugary, greasy food, and weren’t as exercise conscious as twenty-first century Americans. Many in their mid-sixties had heart attacks—and died. Today, we do much better, from about 600 deaths from heart disease per one hundred thousand Americans in 1950—700 per hundred thousand males—to fewer than 165 per hundred thousand in 2017 (www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/2018/005.pdf). Heart disease remains the number one killer of Americans, but only about 2 percent of the 30 million people diagnosed with ...