How caring for dogs and cats explains human health spending
Pet care markets look a little like the market for human health care.
In almost every year since the 1960s, health care spending has grown at least as fast as the overall economy, and often much faster. Health economists have long debated why.
Strange as it may sound, how we care for our pets offers some answers.
The pet care markets look a little like the market for human health care. Health spending by U.S. households has grown 50 percent between 1996 and 2012. Pet care spending has grown by a similar amount, 60 percent, although from a much smaller base. (Americans spent more than $15 billion on pet health care in 2015, but $3.2 trillion on human health care.)
An estimated 68 percent of households have pets; those families with higher incomes spend more, which is also true of human care. And they spend more toward the end of humans’ and pets’ lives alike.
The supply of both physicians and of veterinarians has grown at a more rapid rate than over-
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