So it’s not implausible that the health system could explain a fairly large share of the rest of that gain. Mr. Cutler’s work also compared the life-lengthening benefits of the health system with what it costs. In total, each additional year of life gained between 1960 and 2000 attributed to the health system cost nearly $20,000. It’s findings like these that have led some scholars to argue that health care is so valuable that we should be willing to spend even more on it. “What we really want to know is, how much does an extra dollar spent on health care buy us today?” Dr. Jena said.

Source: New York Times May 20, 2019 09:01 UTC