The New York Times reports that since 2001, employees’ average cost of an annual health care premiums for family coverage has nearly doubled – to $3,300, up from $1,800 – while incomes have come nowhere close to keeping up. Factor in other out-of-pocket medical costs, and the portion of the average American household’s income that goes toward health care has risen about 12 percent, according to the consulting and accounting firm Deloitte, and is now approaching one-fifth of the average household’s spending.

But I thought health care would become more affordable once we passed tort reform…wasn’t that one of the promises the insurance and medical lobbies made when they bought the Legislature and sold our rights?