The Drop In Health Care Spending in First Quarter Followed Surge in Fourth Quarter of 2013

The NYT noted that a sharp drop in health care spending reduced the first quarter growth rate by 0.16 percentage points. It is important to recognize that this drop followed a surge in health care spending reported for the fourth quarter of 2013 that added 0.62 percentage points to growth in quarter. That compares to an average of 0.28 percentage points for the prior four quarters. It is likely that the data overstated the actual increase in spending in the fourth quarter and therefore also o...