Notice how much health care is costing us? Incredible how much it has gone up the last twenty years. Amazing how much of our income is spent on that! Though not much of a surprise to any of us. More on this soon.....Update: I've been looking at this and studying it. I've come to one conclusion. 1946 looks sweet! It seems like we were healthy, well-fed, fashionable, consumers. Small amounts for gas, cars, maintenance, housing, and medical expenses. More is spent on food and clothing.
Food and clothing surely were more expensive then due to the war and since clothing manufacturing hadn't gone overseas yet. Perhaps, consumers cut back in later generations as costs increased elsewhere, namely for health care. It's a dubious claim, but one that makes sense. The first things I cut out when money is tight are clothes, dining out, and my grocery store buying habits. Namely, I'll go less and I'll buy generic.
However, also consider that for the next ten years food and clothing dropped as manufacturing changes and prices normalized while health care only increased slightly. It looks like we were well into the 60's before health care costs really took off. Overall, it looks like a pretty good time for the American economy. Health care costs have been soaring since the late 70's. Almost doubling in the same period, even adjusted for inflation!
Irregardless of the causes of the drop in expenditures on food and clothing, it's sure is nice that health care costs are filling that potential savings we could have, isn't it?
1 comment:
That's a really great graph, so enlightening to see how gradually we slip into what we consider a normal state of being, a normal state of the economy. Out of all those leading indicators, three are experiencing huge inflation that puts the squeeze everywhere else. I sure wouldn't mind seeing a more recent timespan, too -- maybe the last fifteen years, maybe. I would be curious to see the dips that have happened since I've been aware.
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