Health care in Massachusetts is about 6 percent more expensive than the U.S. average, and medical spending is divided differently among types of care than the national trend, according to data presented Wednesday.
Analyses of Medicare and commercial insurance place spending per person 6 to 7 percent higher in the Bay State than the national average, a figure that has dropped over the past several years, according to the state’s Health Policy Commission.
David Auerbach, the HPC’s director of research and cost trends, told the commission’s board that Massachusetts spent more than any other state on health care per person in 2009, with per capita Medicare spending 9 percent higher and commercial premiums 13 percent higher.
“We’ve reduced that gap,” Auerbach said.
With the average health insurance premium plus cost-sharing clocking in at $20,400 for a typical family while the average salary lands at $64,116, board members voiced concerns about what that higher level of spending means for different income groups in the state.
“There’s been a lot of loose language floating around about, well, you know, we’re higher income, therefore health care spending in Massachusetts is not a problem,” Stuart Altman, the commission’s chairman, said. “And I think what these slides show is that for a significant amount of our population, it is a real problem, and we can’t mask it over by the fact that some of us earn significantly above the national average and can afford it.”