The United States spends
more than $8,000 a person per year on health care, well more than twice what Sweden spends. Yet health outcomes are far better in Sweden along virtually every dimension. Its
infant mortality rate was recently
less than half that of the United States. And males aged 15 to 60 are almost twice as likely to
die in any given year in the United States than in Sweden.
In fairness, those differences result partly from lifestyle. In Sweden, workers are more likely to commute by bicycle than by car and
obesity is far less common. Absolute poverty and
income inequality — both associated with adverse health outcomes — are also lower.
