Making Ends Meet: Reducing Costs at the Pharmacy Counter Will Help Americans Survive Inflation

The high cost of prescription drugs in the United States is a huge health problem and a significant economic problem. Consumers facing increased drug costs report cutting back on key areas of their budget, such as buying food. Rising inflation is exacerbating these financial tradeoffs with household needs such as food, energy, and housing seeing some of the largest cost increases over the past year.

Congress can take immediate steps to lower day-to-day costs for millions of families by passing drug reforms, which have majority support in Congress and support from over 80% of Americans across political parties. In this report, we look at three key elements of drug pricing reform that Congress has recently developed and debated, all of which enjoy widespread support by majorities in both the House and Senate, many of which were included in the House-passed Build Back Better Act (H.R. 5736):

1. Capping out-of-pocket expenses for people enrolled in Medicare.
2. Saving money for families, small businesses, and the country by allowing Medicare to negotiate fair drug prices and preventing drug price increases from rising faster than inflation.
3. Lowering the cost of lifesaving insulin.

For further questions about our report or Families USA’s priorities to lower the cost of prescription drugs, please contact Bailey Reavis at breavis@familiesusa.org.