If You Can’t Afford It, You Don’t Deserve It?
“Health-care costs are climbing much more rapidly than incomes or the growth in the overall economy,” said Sara R. Collins, assistant vice president of the foundation and one of the authors of the study. As gas and food prices have soared and real estate values have fallen, the federal minimum wage is now $3 an hour lower, in real terms, than it was 40 years ago, the study said.
“What is notable is how these problems are spreading up the income scale,” Collins said.
Two-thirds of the working-age population was uninsured, underinsured, reported a medical bill problem or did not get needed health care because of cost in 2007.
More than two in five adults in the 19-to-64 age group reported problems paying medical bills or had accumulated medical debt in 2007, up from one in three in 2005. Their difficulties included not being able to afford medical attention when needed, running up medical debts, dealing with collection agencies about unpaid bills, or having to change their lifestyle to repay medical debts.
… The survey found that 28 percent of working-age adults in 2007 were without insurance at some time during the previous year, up from 24 percent in 2001.
The insured also are facing increasing woes: 61 percent of those with medical debt or bill problems were insured at the time they needed medical attention.
Those without adequate insurance increased to 14 percent of the population in 2007 from 9 percent in 2003.… Half of those with incomes below $20,000 went without insurance during 2007, up one percentage point from 2001. But the figure among moderate-income ($20,000 to $40,000) families increased to 41 percent from 28 percent. Among middle-income ($40,000 to $60,000) families, the figure rose to 18 percent from 13 percent. And among those with incomes above $60,000, it rose to 8 percent from 4 percent.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/19/AR2008081902638.html
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