Not all health expense costs are bad

Isn't it worthwhile to consider/think a little counterintuitively about why health care expenses, or any other expenses for that matter, go up: technological improvements, more affluence in the hands of more people willing to spend it on their health, which is, after all, something without which the rest of life has marginal value:

From Classical Values blog: "The Marginal Cost Of Life"
"In case you didn't catch Glenn Reynolds' must-read piece on health care this weekend:

"But there's another cost that isn't getting enough attention. That's the degree to which a bureaucratized healthcare system will squash medical innovation just as we reach a point where dramatic progress is possible."

"There's a sense in the political class that health care costs are spiraling out of control and Something Must Be Done. But as Megan McArdle notes, pet health care costs are rising at almost exactly the same rate as human health care costs. That argues strongly that the main driver is people's increasing ability and willingness to pay for new treatments to extend their lives and the lives of those they love, number of legs notwithstanding. What's really spiraling out of control is medical progress -- and that's all to the good."

http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/2009/07/the_marginal_co.html