Summary
This report extends the analysis presented in Health expenditure Australia 2012-13 to further explore expenditure on particular categories of health goods and services, including Hospitals, Primary health care, Other recurrent areas of health expenditure and Capital expenditure.
In 2012-13, $55.9 billion was spent on Hospitals in Australia, $52.9 billion on Primary health care and $29.9 billion on Other recurrent areas of health spending. Capital expenditure accounted for a further $8.6 billion.
All funders increased their expenditure on Hospitals between 2002-03 and 2012-13; however, growth in state and territory government funding, at $10.6 billion (a 78.6% increase), was almost double the growth of Australian Government expenditure ($5.4 billion or 37.2% growth). Non-government expenditure grew by $5.6 billion (88.6%).
Over the decade, total spending on Primary health care grew from $32.7 billion to $52.9 billion. Primary health care spending is shared relatively evenly between Australian Government (about 43%) and non-government sources (about 41%).
In 2012-13, the Australian Government accounted for $17.9 billion, or nearly 60%, of the total recurrent expenditure in Other recurrent areas of health care. Individuals provided the next largest source of funds, with an expenditure of $5.4 billion in 2012-13.
In the past 5 years, from 2008-09 to 2012-13, the share of recurrent expenditure on Primary health care has increased slightly from 37.1% to 38.1%, whereas expenditure on Other recurrent areas has declined marginally from 22.2% to 21.5%. There has been no clear trend in the Hospitals proportion over this time, beginning at 40.5% in 2008-09 and ending at 40.3% in 2012-13.
The ratio of Australian Government expenditure on health to tax revenue was 24.8% in 2012-13, down from 26.9% in 2011-12. The ratio of state and territory government expenditure to tax revenue rose from 17.7% in 2002-03 to 24.5% in 2012-13. The ratio of non-government health expenditure to individual net worth varied throughout the decade, beginning the period at 0.61% in 2002-03 and ending the period at a decade high of 0.66% in 2012-13.