Medical Care Inflation Rates

Posted by RAND State Statistics on December 12th, 2020

RAND State Statistics reports a number of inflation databases, including Consumer Prices and Medical Care Inflation. Not surprisingly, Medical Care Inflation has outpaced inflation for most items over a long time period.

Medical care inflation consists of four components: Medical care commodities, criminal statistics, Medical care services, Hospital and related services, and Health insurance. See here for additional detail on Medical Care Inflation categories.

Medical care services increased 8.5% from January 2017 to June 2020, an annual rate of 2.4%. Over the past decade, Medical care services increased 32.8%, an average annual rate of 2.9%

Hospital services also increased significantly from January 2017 to June 2020 BY 10.2%, an annual rate of 2.8%. From January 2010 to June 2020, hospital services increased 54.3%, an annual rate of 4.4%.

Health insurance inflation increased significantly, measuring plus 32.6% from January 2017 to June 2020, an annual rate of 9.9%. Health insurance rates increased minimally in 2017 and 2018, then proceeded to dramatically spike. From June 2019 to June 2020, health insurance increased 14.4%.