Mark Dolliver's Takes: Cure Me, Cheaply

Ask people to assess healthcare in the U.S. as a whole, and you’ll get a negative earful. In a Greenberg Quinlan Rosner poll, 74 percent of adults said they’re dissatisfied with the cost of healthcare in the U.S. People split down the middle on the quality of care—49 percent satisfied, 49 percent dissatisfied. As the chart indicates, they’re less negative about cost and downright cheery about quality when queried about their own situation. What about the tradeoff between cost and quality? Asked which is more important to them personally, 51 percent picked “improving quality” and 42 percent cited “lowering healthcare costs.”