#health-care-spending

#health-care-spending

Foster's experience aligns with a well-known and disturbing trend in American health care: more children are having mental health problems. In 2023, 40% of high school students reported persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness, and 20% had seriously considered attempting suicide, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study. Studies also found that more young people are going to emergency rooms for care an expensive option that can cost thousands of dollars.

The federal government plans to spend a total of $7 trillion in fiscal 2025 but only bring in $5.16 trillion in revenue. That leaves a deficit of approximately $1.8 trillion. The big four expenditures Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, debt interest and defense account for nearly three-quarters of national spending. All other programs for other Cabinet departments and hundreds of agencies, including for social services, infrastructure, farmers, Amtrak, and on and on spend about the same amount each year as the $1.8 trillion we incurred in debt.