Let Americans Keep The Savings They Find: Millions of Americans are already trying to make their health care dollars go further.

Real Clear Wire ^ | 08/21/2026 | Wendy Barnes

[SeekAndFind]

As candidates spend the coming months telling voters how they would transform American health care, they should not overlook reforms that could make care more accessible and affordable without requiring complex new government programs.

Millions of Americans are already trying to make their health care dollars go further. They compare prices, explore alternatives to insurance, and choose lower-cost ways to obtain prescriptions and routine care. Yet federal policies often penalize them for doing exactly what policymakers say they want consumers to do: shop carefully and choose the best value option.

A practical health care affordability agenda should begin with a simple principle: When Americans use their own money to pay for legitimate health care, government rules should help that money go further.

Policymakers can put that principle into practice in two ways.

First, consumers should receive credit for the money they actually spend on prescriptions.

Consider a consumer whose insurance requires an $80 out-of-pocket payment for a prescription. That same drug may be available for $30 through a cash-pay option. Choosing the $30 price should be an easy decision.

But under many health plans, that spending may not count toward the consumer's deductible or annual out-of-pocket maximum because the prescription was purchased outside of traditional insurance. The consumer saves $50 at the pharmacy counter but forfeits credit for the $30 spent.

That is not how a system designed to encourage cost-conscious choices should work.

The Every Dollar Counts Act, introduced this year by Rep. Greg Murphy, M.D., offers a straightforward solution that lawmakers on both sides of the aisle should support. It would require out-of-pocket spending on covered prescription drugs to count toward a consumer's deductible and out-of-pocket maximum regardless of where the medication is purchased.

Americans should not have to choose between finding the lowest available price and receiving the full value of their insurance. If enacted, this legislation would help remove that tradeoff.

Second, Congress should modernize flexible spending accounts (FSAs) and health savings accounts (HSAs) to reflect how people receive health care today. These accounts allow consumers to use pre-tax dollars for qualified medical expenses, but health care delivery is evolving more quickly than the rules governing which expenses qualify.

Consumers increasingly use low-cost memberships that provide access to discounted prescriptions, virtual visits, or other health care services. In many cases, a consumer can use FSA or HSA funds for the prescription or appointment itself, but not for the membership that unlocks the lower price.

Congress has already begun to recognize that health care memberships can be legitimate medical expenses. As of this year, certain direct primary care memberships can be paid tax-free from an HSA under a change implemented through IRS guidance. But that change is narrowly limited, leaving out broader memberships that may combine prescription savings, virtual care, and other services.

Lawmakers should extend the same principle to other health care memberships and to HSAs and FSAs. Clear eligibility standards and reasonable monthly limits could prevent abuse while allowing consumers to use their own health care dollars for services specifically designed to reduce the cost of care.

Neither of these proposals would replace insurance or require Washington to construct a new health care system. They would simply update existing policies to reflect how Americans already seek and pay for care.

Candidates will continue debating ambitious plans throughout the election season. But affordability is also shaped by technical rules with very real consequences: whether a consumer's spending counts, whether personal health care funds can be used, and whether someone can confidently choose a lower price.

Washington should give people credit for making responsible health care decisions. When Americans find a legitimate way to pay less for the care they need, public policy should reward that choice.

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.

Wendy Barnes is president and CEO of GoodRx, the leading platform for prescription access and affordability.

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TOPICS: Government; Health/Medicine; Society
KEYWORDS: fsa; healthcare; savings

[FlingWingFlyer]

A waste of time. The muzzies and their Handjobmaiden tails will be assigning Death dates to everyone after a certain age. That’s the way communism works. The ragheads said we served 9/11. Wait until we get to deserve euthanasia.

[Brian Griffin]

Mind your own business.

The whole point of the PPACA is to have lots of people overpay so a few people can grossly underpay.

I’ve paid about $7,000 in Medicare Part B premiums so far and gotten a pneumonia vaccine jab.

I’ve also gotten an antibiotic prescription for $12.

For me to pay $2,500 for Part B means Medicare Part B care on average costs about $12,500/year.

That’s doctor visits, physical therapy and injectable drugs.

At $150 a doctor visit, that would be nearly 100 doctor visits a year.

[Brian Griffin]

In my youth, when I went to the doctor, my mother wrote a check.

In my youth, when I got a prescription, my mother wrote a check.

[Tacrolimus1mg]

Insurance is supposed to be for catastrophic occurrences, not daily needs. You don’t use car insurance for an oil change, you use it for a major accident or act of God that did massive damage to your vehicle. The same should apply to medical care. Prices would drop without insurance companies and PBMs butting in and taking a piece. And bureaucracy in doctor’s offices would be cut out due to being obsolete.

I work in a pharmacy and have been a patient since I was 15. I’m on some extraordinarily expensive drugs, which are another beast. Our drugs cost more due to us subsidizing the rest of the world’s medical care, drug development in particular, which cause companies to seek reimbursement through bilking Americans. Don’t get me started on the political lobbying, which should be illegal.

The pharmacies don’y make the money. We don’t make enough per medication on average to even pay for the bottle we dispense it in (which costs about sixty-five cents). All of our profit comes from vaccines and prescribing services. The pharmacy brnefits managers make all of the money. They negotiate with insurance and drug companies to determine pricing. We just dispense the drugs and barely get paid for that.

[oldtech]

This for Vets only. Be sure that you are signed up with your local VA for health care.They can explain the program. Can’t help you unless you are a vet or possibly a surviving spouse.