A response to the graphic suggests that while "this was evidence of an insane and inefficient healthcare system", "if [they] really wanted a chart that captures what’s wrong with America’s healthcare system, [they] should have gone to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ national health expenditures data website and downloaded the figures showing how rampant third-party payment has resulted in consumers directly paying for less than 12 percent of healthcare costs. And when people are purchasing something with (what is perceived to be) other people’s money, it’s understandable that they don’t pay much attention to cost." (http://biggovernment.com/2009/12/29/the-real-healthcare-char...)

I'm sympathetic to this argument given that the American healthcare system is considerably different than many healthcare systems globally in that private insurers acting on behalf of employers (not the users of healthcare) pick up a significant portion of the pie (even if, on a per capita basis, Medicare spending is more than most countries like Canada - though this fact alone begs the question of why the US government wouldn't first seek to fix Medicare).

As a Canadian, the one thing I don't quite understand is how many of my countrymen are so quick to condemn the American system despite all the obvious signs that the Canadian system is unsustainable and failing (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive...). Further, you read about Animal farm like anecdotes (to be fair, I've seen first hand some of this in Canada as well), and you wonder whether or not healthcare systems abroad can really be distinctly categorized between those that are "universal" and "non-universal" given how radically different implementation is - an example from Japan here: http://biglizards.net/blog/archives/2010/01/my_family_the_v....

There are at least 2 other big problems with this graph if presumably it's being used to argue for changes in policy:

(1) The measurement of life expectancy "at birth". The US spends a considerable amount of money aggressively attempting to treat what would otherwise be considered stillborns. (2) The lifestyles of Americans that may have nothing at all to do with healthcare implementation (http://www.usnews.com/health/family-health/articles/2008/04/...) - ie this could very well mean that if the US miraculously grew an entirely public and universal healthcare system as modeled against XYZ country, US life expectancy might not necessarily get any cheaper or better - it is entirely possible that it would become more expensive and worse.