…the Wall Street Journal reports that, at least so far, OTC hearing aids have been a bust. Only about 2% of people with mild hearing loss have purchased an OTC hearing aid. The problem is many of the OTC hearing aids were not much cheaper than prescription models.
Category: Cost of Healthcare
Tuesday Links
- Steve Parente is launching the Health Economists and Academic Leaders (HEAL) Network, to promote rational health reform.
- Why some beneficiaries will pay more for drugs because of the IRA bill.
- Study: 25% of health care spending is wasted and 25% of that could be reduced by policy changes.
- Wealthy nations may be reaching a life expectancy limit.
Monday Links
- CBO: Medicaid spending on illegal aliens has cost Taxpayers over $16.2 Billion in the last three years.
- o1 is the first AI to outperform PhD-level scholars on the toughest Graduate-Level Google-Proof Q&A Benchmark and to excel in solving International Mathematics Olympiad problems.
- AEI: When the social Security Trust Fund becomes exhausted in 2033, most people assume the Treasury will reduce everyone’s monthly benefit check by 21%. In fact, the administration can means test the reduction – protecting the lowest income recipients at the expense of the highest – without any act of Congress.
- In OMB’s new cost benefit analysis, higher income people get lower weights than lower income people. Viscusi on why that matters and what can go wrong.
Study: Nearly Half of Cities are Dominated by only One or Two Large Hospital Systems
The U.S health care system consumes nearly one-in-five dollars of income. The latest figures are Americans pay nearly $4.5 trillion annually for medical care. Of that, about one-third is spent on hospital care. That is about double the proportion of GDP spent on physician care and three times the amount spent on drugs.