Health Costs

The MIDTERMS

KFF Health Tracking Poll: MAHA and the Midterms

Chemical food additive and pesticide concerns associated with the Make America Health Again (MAHA) movement are shared broadly across the public. But when it comes to voters, health care costs are a higher priority and bigger motivator, even among MAHA supporters, a new KFF Health Tracking Poll finds. When asked to identify their most important health priority for government to address, far more MAHA-supporting voters identify lowering the cost of health care (42%) than other issues more closely associated with the movement.

Affordable care act

ACA Marketplace Survey Feature Image - Website

Cost Concerns and Coverage Changes: A Follow-Up Survey of ACA Marketplace Enrollees

This KFF survey is a follow-up survey of adults who had ACA Marketplace insurance in 2025. The survey examines the cost concerns and coverage changes of Marketplace enrollees following the end of the enhanced premium tax credits and finds that half of returning enrollees say their health care costs are “a lot higher” and most expect to cut back on basic household expenses to afford coverage.

Health System Tracker

What Are the Recent Trends in Employer-Based Health Coverage? Employer-sponsored health insurance is the largest source of health coverage for people under 65, but its reach is uneven.

How Does U.S. Life Expectancy Compare to Other Countries? The life expectancy gap between the U.S. and peer countries decreased from 4.1 years in 2023 to 3.7 years in 2024 as U.S. mortality dropped.

How Does Cost Affect Access to Health Care? In 2024, about 1 in 6 adults reported delaying or not getting healthcare due to cost, including medical or mental health care.

How Does Health Spending in the U.S. Compare to Other Countries? While the U.S. still spends the most in total dollars, eight OECD nations had a higher percentage increase in per-person health spending in 2024.

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  • Key Facts on Health Care Use and Costs Among Immigrants

    Issue Brief

    This issue brief draws from the KFF/LA Times Survey of Immigrants and other KFF analyses to highlight immigrants’ health care eligibility, healthcare use and costs, as well as their contributions to the economy and workforce.

  • Drugs Aren’t the Reason the U.S. Spends So Much on Health Care

    From Drew Altman

    Drew Altman’s column in Axios: the U.S. now spends twice per capita what other wealthy countries do on health care. But while drug costs get all the time in public debate, it's hospital and outpatient spending that mostly explains the difference. And that will be impossible to take on without real pain and political risk, he says.

  • Why the U.S. Doesn’t Have More Hospital Beds

    From Drew Altman

    With much of the news focused on the surge capacity of the nation’s hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic, Drew Altman’s Axios column examines why the nation has a shortage of hospital beds and what can be done about it.

  • How have healthcare prices grown in the U.S. over time?

    Feature

    This chart collection explores price increases in private insurance for common services over time and finds significant geographic variation in prices. For example, the average price of a full knee replacement for those in large employer plans increased from $19,595 in 2003 to $34,063 in 2016, growth of 74% compared to a 28% increase in general inflation. The average price of a knee replacement in New York City is more than twice the price of…

  • Why Some Employers are Turning to Progressive Health Benefits

    From Drew Altman

    In this Axios column, Drew Altman examines the status of progressive health benefits (health benefits linked to wage levels) and their pros and cons at a time when employee health costs are rising and wages are flat.

  • New Study Provides Insight and Analysis to Help Explain the Medicare Spending Slowdown

    News Release

    Medicare, the federal health program that provides health care and coverage to 54 million seniors and younger adults with permanent disabilities, is in the midst of an unprecedented slowdown in spending growth.  A new issue brief from the Kaiser Family Foundation, How Much of the Medicare Spending Slowdown Can be Explained? Insights and Analysis from 2014, examines the factors that help explain why Medicare is on track to spend an estimated $580 billion in 2014,…

  • The Connection Between Health Coverage and Income Security

    From Drew Altman

    In this column in The Wall Street Journal's Think Tank, Drew Altman shows how expanding health coverage and improving economic security for working Americans are connected even though they are often part of separate policy debates.