After five years of relatively slow growth, U.S. health care spending rose significantly in 2014, bolstered by millions of new insurance consumers who gained coverage through the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
According to a new analysis from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, health care spending rose 5.3 percent last year, to a total of $3 trillion, or $9,523 per person. Over the previous five years health care spending had risen at an average of 3.7 percent a year. In 2013, the last year before implementation of PPACA, health spending increased only 2.9 percent.
The percentage of the economy taken up by health care also increased slightly, from 17.3 percent to 17.5 percent. Health accounts for a much larger share of the economy in the U.S. than in other industrialized countries.
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