Examinations of health care prices in the US health care system
This session includes three papers, which use a large privately insured claims data set to evaluate US health care prices. There has been an increasing amount of attention by law makers to improving the value of health care by lowering prices and improving quality. The most notable policy change at the national level was the Affordable Care Act (ACA). At the state level, interest in price transparency initiatives is growing. Hospital, physicians, and other providers have also begun to respond to the new policies and initiatives. However, the implications of regulatory changes and provider responses on prices are not fully understood. The first paper in this session examines the impact of the ACA on hospital prices. The second paper also examines hospital prices but in the context of recent state level price transparency initiatives. The third paper explores the implications of provider consolidation on outpatient facility prices.