Malcolm Gladwell on Healthcare

Gladwell points out a NYTimes article by Princeton economist Paul Krugman. Krugman summarizes the results of a recent JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) comparing the US and UK healthcare systems. It is well-known that the US spends more per capita on healthcare than most industrialized countries: about $5200 per year, vs. $2100 per year by the UK. What sets this study apart is the care in controlling for other factors:

• to control for a larger immigrant population and to control for a large and relatively poor black population in the US, the study is limited to non-Hispanic whites in both countries

• the study controls for socio-economic status

• the study is limited to people between the age of 55 and 64

For the results, check out Gladwell's well-written post. The bottom line: we in the US are not getting decent returns on our healthcare spending. Ideally, the study would have compared subjects from the same occupation -- maybe the Americans in the study came from highly stressful professions.