Consumer Out-Of-Pocket Drug Prices Grew Faster Than Prices Faced By Insurers After Accounting For Rebates, 2007-20.

The rising price of branded drugs has garnered considerable attention from the public and policy makers. This article investigates the complexities of pharmaceutical pricing, with an emphasis on the overlooked aspects of manufacturer rebates and out-of-pocket prices. Rebates granted by pharmaceutical manufacturers to insurers reduce the actual prices paid by insurers, causing the true prices of prescriptions to diverge from official statistics.

High Spending Growth Rates For Key Diseases In 2000-14 Were Driven By Technology And Demographic Factors.

We introduce a new source of detailed data on spending by medical condition to analyze US health care spending growth in the period 2000-14. We found that thirty conditions, which represented only 11.5 percent of all conditions studied, accounted for 42 percent of the real growth rate in per capita spending during this period, even though they accounted for only 13 percent of overall spending in 2000.