How Does U.S. Health Spending Compare with Other Countries?
The U.S. spends substantially more on health care than other developed countries. Figure 3 shows per capita health expenditures in 2006 U.S. dollars for Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries with above-average per capita national income. According to OECD data, health spending in the United States was $6,567 in 2006. This amount was 52 percent higher than in the next highest spending country, and about 90 percent higher than in many other countries that we would consider global competitors. As a share of GDP, health care spending in the United States also exceeds that of any of its European counterparts by at least four percentage points. Despite this relatively high level of spending, the United States does not appear to achieve substantially better health benchmarks compared to other developed countries.
