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Authored by Lawrence Wilson via The Epoch Times,

U.S. health care spending reached $5.3 trillion in 2024, according to recently released data from the Department of Health and Human Services.

That includes all health spending through federal and state health programs like Medicare and Medicaid, money paid by individuals to health insurers and providers, spending by employers, and payments made by insurance companies.

Here’s a look at the overall picture of America’s health spending and what that means for consumers and taxpayers.

The United States spends more on health care than any nation in the world.

That’s true whether as a gross amount, a per-capita average of $15,474, or a share of the national economy, 18 percent.

And the amount keeps growing. Per capita health care spending has grown every year since 2000, rising at 77 percent higher than inflation.

Health care is the largest industry in the United States by total spending and employment.

Health care, grouped with social services by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, employed more people than any other industry and was one of the fastest growing U.S. industries.

About $18 of every $100 spent in the United States went to pay for health care in 2024. That’s more than was spent on housing ($12), groceries ($5), national defense ($4), or cars ($3).

Health care spending rose 7.2 percent in 2024, but health care prices accounted for less than half of the increase.

Those prices rose 2.5 percent, which was below the overall inflation rate of 2.9 percent that year.

Most of the increase was due to increased cost or use of other goods and services, the increased demand for medical services, and changes in the population.

The overall demand for medical services increased and was the most significant reason for increased spending, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

Americans spent $768 billion on non-medical expenses in 2024, about 15 percent of health care spending.

Most health care funding is provided by individuals through out-of-pocket payments, health insurance premiums, taxes used to fund government health care programs, or money paid by employers to health insurers in lieu of employee wages.

Most of the money flows through other hands, which include the federal government, state governments, and employers.

President Donald Trump and some Republicans in Congress have proposed placing more discretion for health care spending in the hands of consumers, for example by providing funded health savings accounts to individuals rather than paying subsidies directly to insurance companies.

Democrats, whose legislative and policy proposals generally favor controlling costs through increased regulation and subsidies, have so far opposed that idea.

Health care spending accounted for more than a quarter (27 percent) of all federal spending in 2024 and was the largest spending category.

The cost of health care is the greatest financial worry for Americans, according to recent polling from health policy research group KFF.

Two-thirds of Americans (66 percent) said they worried about being able to afford insurance premiums and medical bills. Health expenses were a greater concern than paying for utilities, food, housing, and gas.

More than half (55 percent), said their health care costs had increased in the past year.

Authored by Jeff Louderback via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Three years have passed since a Norfolk Southern freight train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in East Palestine, an eastern Ohio village near the Pennsylvania border.

On Feb. 3, the disaster’s third anniversary, The National Institutes of Health (NIH) held a grand opening ceremony for the East Palestine Train Derailment Health Research Program Office.

The office will serve as the home to a five-year, $10 million research initiative to assess and address the long-term health outcomes stemming from the derailment.

“NIH’s research hub offers the people of East Palestine a pathway to clear answers about their health they deserve,” said Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

“Everyone affected by this environmental disaster deserves access to independent, gold-standard science that puts their well-being first.”

Life in East Palestine abruptly changed around 9 p.m. on Feb. 3, 2023.

The crew of a Norfolk Southern Railway freight train carrying 151 cars saw smoke and fire, and realized that 38 cars had derailed.

The flammable, toxic chemicals in 11 derailed cars had ignited, with flames spreading to an additional 12 cars.

According to the National Transportation Safety Board, nine cars were carrying hazardous materials in addition to the 11 that derailed.

The hazardous chemicals, including vinyl chloride in some of the rail cars, began to spill onto the ground and into the air.

Vinyl chloride is used to make PVC pipes and other products.

The National Cancer Institute notes that the toxic chemical has been linked to cancers of the brain, lungs, blood, lymphatic system, and liver.

Vinyl chloride creates carbon monoxide and hydrogen chloride when it burns.

When the latter mixes with water, it generates hydrochloric acid, a corrosive substance that can burn the skin and eyes, and is toxic if inhaled.

Burning vinyl chloride also produces a small amount of phosgene gas, which was used as a chemical weapon on World War I battlefields.

As the fire continued, authorities on Feb. 6—fearing shrapnel from a major explosion—decided on a controlled detonation of five cars, which sent a massive cloud of black smoke into the sky.

Visible for miles, it was likened to the mushroom cloud caused by a nuclear weapon.

The government characterized it as a “controlled burn,” but residents said it was anything but controlled.

A dark cloud of chemical-filled smoke could be seen for miles, and debris landed on properties several miles away.

The train cars were ruptured in the detonation, and spilled the rest of their contents into a drainage ditch connecting to Sulphur Run, a stream that flows through the heart of East Palestine.

Before the burn, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine urged residents to evacuate a one-by-two-mile area surrounding East Palestine, which included parts of Ohio and Pennsylvania.

DeWine described the urgent evacuation as a “matter of life and death.”

Three days later, DeWine held a press conference announcing that the evacuation order had been lifted and residents could return to their homes.

Norfolk Southern trains resumed their routes through East Palestine, and federal and state officials said testing showed that the air and water were safe.

Fear and uncertainty remain among East Palestine residents.

Many locals complained about a toxic smell in the air, burning eyes, rashes, headaches, and other health issues.

These reports prompted concerns about potential long-term health effects, including “maternal and child health, as well as psychological, immunological, respiratory and cardiovascular health,” according to the NIH.

“This research program is designed to bring rigorous, independent science directly to the community,” NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya said.

“By establishing a local presence, we can better engage residents, support enrollment in studies, and ensure the research reflects the real experiences and concerns of the people affected.”

After the grand opening, a community meeting was held to outline the research program, explain how residents can enroll in studies, and provide people a chance to ask questions and share their experiences directly with researchers.

Jami Wallace was a lifelong East Palestine resident until the derailment.

She no longer lives in the community but has served as an outspoken advocate for people who have experienced health consequences from the disaster.

“I was diagnosed after the derailment with hypothyroidism. I’ve been diagnosed with asthma, I’ve been diagnosed with an adult chronic cough, I have a cyst on my right ovary that I have to have an operation on,” said Wallace, who is co-founder of the Chemically Impacted Communities Coalition.

“I get phone calls every day from people who are seeing cancers and thyroid disease, respiratory and neurological issues. You can’t tell me it’s not from those chemicals.

“I’ll fight Norfolk Southern, and I will fight my own government until we get accountability and we get justice.”

The Feb. 3 event included researchers and representatives from NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the University of Kentucky, the University of Pittsburgh, and Yale University.

“Since the beginning, we have seen the public experience respiratory issues, we’ve seen and heard about rashes, nose bleeds in children, eczema, reproductive health questions and concerns, so now we have a team of about sixteen scientists on our team that can help answer those questions for the public,” Dr. Erin Haynes of the University of Kentucky said.

“We have learned that the community is experiencing health conditions from the derailment, and we want to be able to give them answers to know if it is a true direct association.

“A lot of things are unanswered, but this large-scale study that we now have funding to do will really help answer those questions.”

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

With polling showing over 80 percent of Americans in favor of voter ID laws, it is hard to come up with reasons why you need an ID to board a plane but not vote in a federal election. That was particularly glaring this week when Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) required people to show an ID to attend his campaign events after opposing an ID requirement to vote. So if you want to hear Ossoff speak against voter ID, you will have to show your ID. Now Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) has a rather bizarre argument: the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, if passed, would likely violate the 19th Amendment to the Constitution.

CNN Host Kasie Hunt told Raskin that “Voter ID is supported by the majority of Americans. But there are Democrats on the Hill and you voted against this? Why not support voter ID?”

Raskin then had this curious response:

“… what’s wrong with the Save act? What’s wrong with it is that it might violate the 19th Amendment, which gives women the right to vote, because you’ve got to show that all of your different IDs match.

So if you’re a woman who’s gotten married and you’ve changed your name to your husband’s name, but you’re so now your current name is different from your name at birth.

Now you’ve got to go ahead and document that you need an affidavit explaining why. And why would we go to all of these, troubles in order to keep people from voting when none of the states that are actually running the elections are telling us that there’s any problem.”

In fact, under various voter ID laws, states can create systems to address issues such as different maiden names or name changes following a divorce, including requiring a standard attestation provided by the state.

Nothing in the SAVE Act requires birth certificates be brought to polling places. 

It allows for the use of a signed attestation supplied by the state.

As for identification, various forms are allowed:

The legislation would require documentation that shows an individual was born in the U.S., including either:

• An ID that complies with the REAL ID Act and indicates the holder is a citizen;

• A passport;

• A military ID card and military record of service that shows a person was born in the U.S.;

• A government-issued photo ID that shows the person’s place of birth was in the U.S.;

• Other forms of government-issued photo ID, if they’re accompanied by a birth certificate, comparable document or naturalization certificate.

Now, on the 19th Amendment, Raskin’s argument is simply ridiculous. Indeed, if this were credible, why has it not been used successfully against prior state voting ID laws? Rather than making this claim on CNN, it would be interesting for Raskin to try it in court once the SAVE Act passes.

It is unlikely to succeed because the 19th Amendment guarantees the right to vote, but, like all citizens, women can be asked to prove their eligibility to vote. The suggestion that requiring a signature on an attestation form is a barrier to voting is simply incredible.

The Nineteenth Amendment provides:

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Requiring proof of your identity neither denies nor abridges the right to vote. Indeed, for supporters of voter ID laws, it protects the right to vote by ensuring that only eligible voters are counted in elections.

Would requiring the REAL ID also violate constitutional rights like the right to travel or association for those with name changes? Of course not. The government may require basic identification for such transactions while creating reasonable methods of addressing name or address changes.

The claim of a 19th Amendment violation is spurious but par for the course in our current political environment. As with claims that democracy is about to die, these inflammatory claims are designed to distract voters who overwhelmingly support Voter ID. Democratic members are unified in opposing such laws. That is a debate that should be resolved on the merits, not meritless constitutional claims.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

Venture capitalist David Sacks has slammed The New York Times for its glaring failure to scrutinize Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn co-founder emerging as the top Silicon Valley figure in the explosive Jeffrey Epstein files.

In a scathing segment on the All-In Podcast, Sacks highlighted how the establishment media targets right-leaning tech moguls while giving a free pass to left-wing donors deeply entangled with Epstein.

“Brad, you speak about the corruption of power centers. I think a major one has to be The New York Times,” Sacks urged.

David Sacks Asks Why the New York Times is Protecting Reid Hoffman ?

“The number one person in the Epstein files from Silicon Valley which is Reid Hoffman … stayed at not just the island, but the townhouse and the New Mexico ranch.”

“The New York Times clearly has a list of… pic.twitter.com/NJzwdrcnbg

— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) February 7, 2026

“The number-one person in the Epstein files from Silicon Valley which is Reid Hoffman mentioned 2,600 times had a multiyear relationship with Epstein and they call each other very good friends. They did deals together,” Sacks explained.

He continued, “Reid stayed at the trifecta which is not just the island but the townhouse and the New Mexico ranch. And if you’re gonna write about Mark Zuckerberg organize that famous dinner how can you not mention that as the root of Epstein’s involvement in Silicon Valley?”

“And yet Reid just gets a mentioned in one sentence of article along with several other people,” Sacks stressed.

He accused the Times of selective outrage, noting “It is crazy. I mean The New York Times clearly has a list people they consider approved targets. They are all right coded people like Elon or Peter Thiel.”

“And they become targets but the people who have donated hundreds millions dollars to the Democrat Party and have paid for dirty tricks against Trump, they basically are spared. Honestly this is just emblematic of the whole institutional rot in a distrust in the country right there,” Sacks explained.

“Part of the cabal, it’s part of the institutions that people are losing faith in, and you know Epstein was a scumbag and the fact of matter is we’re not seeing equal play on both sides,” Sacks further urged.

The remarks come amid fresh revelations from the Justice Department’s massive Epstein document dump, which includes emails showing Hoffman’s ongoing interactions with the convicted sex offender long after his 2008 plea deal.

Newly unsealed emails reveal Hoffman discussing visits to Epstein’s notorious private island, his New Mexico ranch, and his New York apartment. One 2015 message has Epstein boasting about a “wild dinner” with Hoffman, Mark Zuckerberg, and others.

?BREAKING: Newly released Jeffrey Epstein emails reveal LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman discussing visits to Epstein's private island, New Mexico ranch, and New York apartment.

"Reid will spend the night at 71st"

"Reid Hoffman will go to the ranch for the weekend"

"Jeffrey will… pic.twitter.com/eRGEecI2KG

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) January 30, 2026

A 2012 email to Epstein referred to Reid Hoffman, who founded LinkedIn, as the “fatty at LinkedIn.”

Follow: @AFpost pic.twitter.com/cQ2LsVLmUS

— AF Post (@AFpost) February 2, 2026

The Free Beacon detailed how Hoffman maintained the relationship years after claiming it ended, including Skype calls, sushi meetings, and phone dates—all while Epstein name-dropped tech elites to lure investments.

Democratic megadonor and LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman issued a mea culpa late Tuesday, acknowledging that he met and interacted with Jeffrey Epstein long after he said his relationship with the disgraced pedophile stopped.

It came after a Free Beacon report spotlighted… pic.twitter.com/K5ysSuW04g

— Washington Free Beacon (@FreeBeacon) February 5, 2026

Hoffman denies any wrongdoing.

I only knew Jeffrey Epstein because of a fundraising relationship with MIT, which I very much regret. In 2019 I told Axios the last meeting I had with him was in 2015 but I was mistaken, as according to calendar entries I have become aware there were additional fundraising…

— Reid Hoffman (@reidhoffman) February 4, 2026

This selective media coverage underscores a broader pattern where globalist insiders and Democrat funders evade accountability, while critics of the establishment face relentless attacks.

This is how I knew so long ago that Reid Hoffman went to Epstein’s island.

Epstein used Reid being there to try to get me to go, not realizing that it would have the opposite effect ? pic.twitter.com/zrOIq4gWaR

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 1, 2026

The following thread (click through) details the extent of the relationship between Epstein and Hoffman.

1/ Reid Hoffman introduced Jeffrey Epstein to Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, and Elon Musk

In May 2014, Jeffrey Epstein emailed his assistant:

“Ask Reid Hoffman’s secretary for Thiel’s phone number as we were supposed to meet in New York on Monday.”

In July 2015, Hoffman… pic.twitter.com/kzKTeVW2VE

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) January 30, 2026

As the Epstein saga unravels, it exposes how power protects its own, fueling public distrust in institutions that prioritize partisan loyalty over truth.

Our earlier report detailed House Oversight Chairman James Comer’s push to question Bill Gates on his Epstein ties, amid bipartisan demands for answers. This aligns with Sacks’ critique of uneven scrutiny on elite figures.

We also covered Hillary Clinton’s attempt to turn her deposition into a public spectacle, dodging private grilling.

A further chilling email we covered hinted at depopulation discussions between Epstein and Gates, interpreted by some as elite scheming.

And then there are the tunnels. What was going on with the tunnels?

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.

Authored by Jenna McCarthy via Jenna's Side,

Many, many years ago—we’re talking decades—I got into a fight with a boy I’d been dating for (thankfully) not very long. I can’t even recall what the argument was about, but I’ll never forget his very last words to me:

“God, you’re so stupid.”

“There are plenty of insults you could fling at me that would be accurate,” I informed him by way of a breakup. “Hot-headed, demanding, defensive, defiant, opinionated, unfiltered, gets hangry if not fed every four hours—let me help you out—but make no mistake, stupid isn’t one of them.”

I think of that moment every once in a while, for instance when I hear celebrities, Facebook “friends,” or the coven of professional scolds over at The View whining about the “fascist dictator” in the White House. And not because my reaction is “God, you’re so stupid”—although it one hundred percent is—but because they’re obviously just reaching for the nastiest insult in the bag and hoping it sticks. It’s basically the “your mom is so ugly, she made an onion cry” of political attacks.

Trump is arguably bombastic. He is egomaniacal. He can be rude and misogynistic and childish. He fires off 3 A.M. Twitter tantrums like a drunk raccoon, insults world leaders to their faces, and was busted bragging about grabbing women by the… lady parts. If he were your uncle, no one would blame you for not inviting him to your wedding.

But a dictator he is not.

Let me prove it: In America, the worst thing that happens when you stream a boy band is that Spotify recommends more boy bands. Do you know what happens in North Korea? If you’re lucky, you’re sent to a labor camp. If you’re not so lucky, you could face the death penalty. That is not hyperbole.

According to a new Amnesty International report, North Koreans—including children—are being publicly executed for watching South Korean dramas or listening to music by groups like BTS. (Rich families can sometimes bribe officials to escape elimination, so apparently corruption is universal—although the price tag is often too high for many.) Thanks to Kim Jong Un’s 2020 Law on Rejecting Reactionary Thought and Culture, consequences for consuming or distributing unapproved entertainment range from five to fifteen years of forced labor and a public shaming to being brutally unalived in front of an audience as a gruesome cautionary tale.

But please, Joy Behar, tell me again how you’re living under a fascist regime.

North Korean escapees describe being lined up and marched to public executions as part of their “ideological education,” designed expressly to terrorize citizens into compliance. Tens of thousands of people dragged to a field to watch someone die for enjoying an unapproved TV show. Meanwhile, over here, “ideological education” means attending a corporate DEI seminar with lukewarm coffee, sitting through a required HR video about tone in the workplace, or getting lectured by a celebrity who listened to one podcast and now identifies as a constitutional scholar.

You poor, tortured souls. Please reward yourselves with a matcha latte; your activism must be exhausting.

Here’s a little reality check: if your fascist dictator allows you to tweet “FASCIST DICTATOR!!!” in all caps directly from your couch while wearing pajama pants you bought from the TikTok shop, you are not, in fact, living under a fascist dictator. If your most humiliating public moment is the time you accidentally replied-all to an office-wide email and called your boss an insufferable twatwaffle, you are not a victim of political oppression. And if the most hazardous consequence of your entertainment consumption is Hulu finding out you’re logged into your ex’s account and booting you off the platform, you do not live in an authoritarian state. You live in America, where the biggest threats to your freedoms are TSA confiscating your tweezers or Trader Joe’s discontinuing your favorite spicy peanut salad dressing.

“This country is an authoritarian hellscape,” the liberal left loves to lament. I know, it feels cool to say. It’s dramatic. It gets likes and comments and retweets. But if your alleged authoritarian hellscape permits you to organize protests against it, pen songs decrying it, record podcasts objecting to it, and sell merch mocking it, then maybe “authoritarian hellscape” isn’t the right term. Maybe it’s more like “stable, open society with Wi-Fi and too many microphones.” (Also, if it’s so dystopian, feel free to expatriate yourself. No, really. Flights leave hourly.)

These are the same Defenders of Democracy™, I’ll remind the class, who cheered when the unvaccinated were barred from restaurants, fired from their jobs, and banished from polite society altogether. The same hall-monitor brigade that applauded mask mandates, school closures, travel bans, curfews, capacity limits, and the glorious era of “Show Me Your Papers” vaccine passports. And now they want to style themselves as freedom fighters living under an iron-fisted despot? Please. These people didn’t just tolerate tyranny—they demanded it. They celebrated it. They literally couldn’t get enough of it.

When Barack Obama was droning American citizens overseas without trial, the left went mute. When Bill Clinton endorsed the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, no celebrity declared we were living under a dictatorship. When Joe Biden tried to impose sweeping vaccine mandates through OSHA and attempted a massive student-loan bribery “forgiveness” plan via emergency powers—both slapped down as unconstitutional—the same people now screaming “authoritarian takeover!” were too busy knitting vagina beanies to notice. Funny how the outrage only kicks in when authoritarianism strolls in wearing a red hat.

So when the likes of Cher and Jim Carrey and John Legend and Bette Midler and George Clooney and Kathy Griffin and Bruce Springsteen use their public platforms to call out Trump’s fascist takeover of America, their claims collapse under their own weight. Because real authoritarianism doesn’t let you complain about authoritarianism. That’s sort of the whole point.

A dictatorship, for the record, is somewhere people cannot complain. Where they cannot consume outside media. Where the government can kill you for pressing play on the wrong USB drive. Where state power and fear control every aspect of life—not where a disliked political figure exercises lawful constitutional authority and triggers a tantrum.

And it’s not just North Korea. Zooming out even slightly reveals an entire planet of governments behaving in ways that make America’s “fascism” discourse look like a middle-school slam contest. (“Your mom’s so dumb, she studied for her Covid test!”). In China, people are disappeared for practicing the wrong religion, posting the wrong sentence, or attending the wrong protest; an entire ethnic minority has been shoved into “re-education” camps large enough to be visible from space. In Iran, teenagers are executed for chanting slogans, women are beaten for a strand of visible hair, and the government turns off the internet whenever it gets even a faint whiff of protest. In Russia, critics are jailed, poisoned, or randomly “fall out of windows.” In Afghanistan, girls are banned from school and public executions are a weekly event. These are governments that don’t merely dislike dissent—they annihilate it.

We, on the other hand, live in a country where we can march in the streets chanting “No Kings!” and not a single king will try to stop us.

Seeing the internet teeming with rants about America being one executive order away from total collapse feels like watching a Babylon Bee meme come to life. Because when people are free to say what they think, vocally dislike who they please, and watch anything they want without fear of a firing squad and somehow label that fascism, they’re not oppressed—they’re just spelling freedom wrong.

The next time a celebrity relaunches their “We are literally living under Mussolini” monologue while sipping an $8 iced coffee and documenting themselves flipping off their president, feel free to drop a reminder in the comments that there are places where people are dying because they downloaded the TV show those same celebrities binge-watched on their way to the Save Democracy Brunch.