Priced Out

The reasons American health care costs more yet delivers less than health systems in other advanced nations are the subject of Uwe E. Reinhardt's account. Reinhardt, an adviser to presidents and Congress on health reform who helped originate key features of the Affordable Care Act, argues that the problem is one of social ethics rather than economics: the United States has never settled how far people should be their brothers' and sisters' keepers in health care. He traces the chaotic, secretive and inefficient ways the country pays for care and weighs recent reform proposals. His own proposal is that every American choose by age 26 between community-rated insurance and going uninsured or buying coverage priced by health status.

Drew Altman, president of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, endorsed it and called Reinhardt the moral conscience of the health care system, and Commonwealth Fund president David Blumenthal praised how the late economist untangles that system with precision and moral clarity.