Health Care Facts

• 29,000 people in Tacoma , 113,000 in Pierce County , 800,000 in Washington State , and 47,000,000 in the United States are uninsured.
  
  
• Of all 37 wealthy nations, the United States is the only one without universal health care. Americans spend more than twice as much per capita on health care than any other industrialized country in the world -- $7,100/year vs. $2,500/year in other countries.
  
  
•  The United States ranks 41st in life expectancy among all nations. Our infant mortality rate is the same as Albania ’s! We have higher rates of obesity, heart disease, asthma and cancer than any other wealthy nation.
  
  
• About 64% of our health care system is financed by public money: federal and state taxes, property taxes and tax subsidies. These funds pay for Medicare, Medicaid, the VA, coverage for public employees (including teachers), elected officials, military personnel, etc. There are also hefty tax subsidies to employers to help pay for their employees’ health insurance. About 17% of heath care is financed by all of us individually through out-of-pocket payments, such as co-pays, deductibles, the uninsured paying directly for care, people paying privately for premiums, etc. Private employers only pay 19% of health care costs.
  

• 18,000 Americans die every year because they don’t have health insurance. No other industrialized nation rations health care to the degree that the U.S. does. But there is more than enough money in our health care system to serve everyone if it were spent wisely. Administrative costs are far higher in the U.S. than in other countries’ systems.