The Cost Disease: Why Computers Get Cheaper and Health Care Doesn't - Hardcover

Baumol, William J.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300179286 ISBN 13: 9780300179286

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2012

Synopsis

The exploding cost of health care in the United States is a source of widespread alarm. Similarly, the upward spiral of college tuition fees is cause for serious concern. In this concise and illuminating book, the well-known economist William J. Baumol explores the causes of these seemingly intractable problems and offers a surprisingly simple explanation. Baumol identifies the "cost disease" as a major source of rapidly rising costs in service sectors of the economy. Once we understand that disease, he explains, effective responses become apparent.

Baumol presents his analysis with characteristic clarity, tracing the fast-rising prices of health care and education in the United States and other major industrial nations, then examining the underlying causes, which have to do with the nature of providing labor-intensive services. The news is good, Baumol reassures us, because the nature of the disease is such that society will be able to afford the rising costs.

About this title

About the Author:

William J. Baumol is professor of economics and academic director of the Berkley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, New York University, and professor emeritus, Princeton University. He lives in New York City.

Review:

"A provocative and timely critique of the fallacies in the conventional wisdom that we can no longer afford good education and decent health care."—Sir Harold Evans, author of They Made America (Sir Harold Evans 2012-02-06)

“It’s a testament to Professor Baumol’s lucid prose, though, that economists and noneconomists alike will find it easy to grasp his surprisingly comforting argument for why we shouldn’t panic. . . .This book is a quick read, packed with charts and case studies. But it is the author’s command of storytelling that makes it not just digestible but also enjoyable.”—Amy Wallace, The New York Times  (Amy Wallace The New York Times)

“Health-care costs are huge, and still rising. Based on current trends, in 2105 US health care will consume 62% of our national income.  And this is nothing to worry about. How can this be? Relying primarily on simple logic and storytelling, NYU economist William J. Baumol lays out the answer in his new book.”—Kyle Smith, New York Post (Kyle Smith New York Post 2012-09-24)

“In this important book, William Baumol and his co-authors have shown how divergent productivity trends have profound implications for how society deals with increasingly expensive sectors like education and health.”—William Nordhaus, Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University (William Nordhaus)

“An excellent book that puts to the sword many health care myths. . . . [A] necessary read for anyone who is engaged in health care costs.”—Lancet Oncology
(Lancet Oncology)

About this edition

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0300179286
• ISBN 13: 9780300179286
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272