The Volokh Conspiracy - Cowen on Medicare Spending:

Economist Tyler Cowen of Marginal Revolution has a good piece in today's NYT on medicare spending. It begins:

Medicare expenditures threaten to crush the federal budget, yet the Obama administration is proposing that we start by spending more now so we can spend less later.

This runs the risk of becoming the new voodoo economics. If we can't realize significant savings in health care costs now, don't expect savings in the future, either.

It's not the profits of the drug companies or the overhead of the insurance companies that make American health care so expensive, but the financial incentives for doctors and medical institutions to recommend more procedures, whether or not they are effective. So far, the American people have been unwilling to say no.

Read the whole thing.

	[Jonathan Adler, June 14, 2009 at 10:49am] Trackbacks Cowen on Medicare Spending: Economist Tyler Cowen of Marginal Revolution has a good piece in today's NYT on medicare spending. It begins: Medicare expenditures threaten to crush the federal budget, yet the Obama administration is proposing that we start by spending more now so we can spend less later. This runs the risk of becoming the new voodoo economics. If we can't realize significant savings in health care costs now, don't expect savings in the future, either. It's not the profits of the drug companies or the overhead of the insurance companies that make American health care so expensive, but the financial incentives for doctors and medical institutions to recommend more procedures, whether or not they are effective. So far, the American people have been unwilling to say no. Read the whole thing.