At 50, Medicare is a Stunning Success

Medicare, the government healthcare program that anyone over 65 who has held a job and paid taxes is eligible for, is turning 50, and the half-century mark provides a great opportunity to look back at the program and how it has changed the lives of millions of Americans for the better.

Business Insider reports that since 1999, the number of hospitalizations and deaths of people on Medicare has declined, while costs have decreased relative to inflation, which is nearly unheard of in the healthcare industry, where costs typically outgrow buying power by around 8 percent annually. This increase has slowed somewhat since the institution of Obamacare.

When it comes to costs, they are 15% lower than they were in 1999 when adjusted for inflation, while deaths fell from 5.3% to 4.43% percent.

In a reflection of how medicine and hospital care have advanced in the past 15 years, hospital deaths fell for both those who were hospitalized within 30 days or a year, while hospitalizations overall fell 23 percent for the period covered in the study.

NPR reports that in addition to hospital deaths decreasing, the cost of hospital visits fell from an average of $3,290 to $2,801.

These changes are also important because if they continue it means people will have more money to spend on themselves and their families in the future given that nearly a fifth of all the spending in the U.S. economy will be on healthcare by 2024. 

All these things are important because the amount of people expected to start using Medicare will only go up as Baby Boomers age, and that cohort has already swelled Medicare enrollment to its highest figure ever, at 55 million members.