In economic terms, health care is a highly successful industry - profitable, growing, and virtually recession-proof - but it's a massive burden on the rest of the economy.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Health care costs are an issue both for the government and for our larger economy.
Health care is one-sixth of our economy. If the government can control that, they can control just about everything. We need to understand what is going on, because there are much more economic models that can be used to give us good health care than what we have now.
Health care in America, despite all you hear, still offers us citizens one of the most efficient and highest quality systems in the world. But it's expensive, and it's only getting worse.
Healthcare is growing now at about 10 per cent per annum in the U.S. top line, versus 3 per cent for the economy. As someone with a sharp pencil and an eye for this kind of thing, this can't last.
Healthcare has been the last major industry that hasn't been touched by technology in terms of productivity and consumer adoption in the way so many other industries have.
Health care comprises nearly 20 percent of our national economy, but outdated bureaucracy and red tape have stifled competition and raised costs. As a result, today more than 45 million are without any health coverage.
People don't like it, but inevitably we need to think about both the costs and the benefits of health care. We cannot avoid the financial consequences.
I'm no health care expert, but you've got technology that constantly advances the ability to extend life and maybe improve lifestyle. That puts constant upward pressure on health care costs.
What we're really trying to do is level out the health care system. It has gotten so one-sided as more and more people have been put into managed care; in fact, about 70 percent of the patients in the country.
Health care's like any other product or service: if the consumer is in charge of spending his money on it, then the market will make sure that it is affordable.