>>Don't be too sure.

Typical partisan politics, people with no evidence accusing their opponents of having no evidence. ;-)

Trouble is that it's not always easy to measure, since healthcare costs are going up regardless.

IMHO: physicians can be marvelous custodians of scarce resources. I was privileged to observe more than one of the previous generation's diagnosticians at work, identifying rare conditions merely by watching and taking a history. We used to say that history is 80% of the diagnosis. Much of that has been replaced by barrages of tests with far less time spent talking to patients. That's expensive. It's also a lot quicker for the physician who can no longer earn a living unless she races through her quota of patients and performs a quota of procedures on them.

IMHO it would save the system a fortune to pay physicians better. Pay them as much as a lawyer of equivalent seniority, for example, and incentivize them to sit with patients and listen rather than rushing to the next patient, the next procedure. Restore pride in finding the diagnosis with a history, an exam and 2 blood tests rather than a blunderbuss of 100 tests, a MRI and a referral to a neurosurgeon. And relearn the truth that time with a sympathetic doctor itself carries immense value for somebody who is unwell and afraid.

Will it happen? I doubt it. They say that medicine consists of art and science, but IMHO people often confuse one for the other. If people want a simple answer to the question of rising cost, that's a big part of it IMHO.