Rational Rationing: Impossible or Inevitable

摘要

Health care spending in the United States is expected to exceed $930 billion in1993. Cost containment measures achieve one-time savings at the margins but fail to control the underlying causes of rising health care expenditures. These causes are new technology, an aging population, and high labor costs with low productivity growth. The national health care dilemma requires that we--as individuals and as a Nation--consciously and rationally decide what we expect from our future health care delivery system and how best to transform the current system. Rationing care in a rational manner is desirable contrasted to the current health care system that rations care irrationally based primarily upon one's ability to pay.