Uninsured Pay $30 Billion Per Year for Health Care

People living in the U.S. who don't have health insurance will pay $30 billion this year for care. A new study suggests that uninsured Americans will also receive $56 billion worth of free care.

U.S. government health programs pay for about 75 percent, or roughly $43 billion, of the bills for uninsured people. The new study was conducted by Jack Hadley of George Mason University in Virginia.

"Physicians' donated time and forgone profits amount to $7.8 billion. After government payments to hospitals are subtracted, private philanthropy and profit margins are responsible for at least an additional $6.3 billion," a team at the Urban Institute reported.

"From society's perspective, covering the uninsured is still a good investment. Failure to act in the near term will only make it more expensive to cover the uninsured in the future, while adding to the amount of lost productivity from not insuring all Americans," Hadley said in a statement.

An uninsured American pays $583 out of pocket toward average annual medical costs of $1,686 per person. A person with private insurance pays far more in annual medical costs at $3,915, with $681, or 17 percent.

Over 47 million Americans go without health insurance. 28 million people have gone without insurance for most of 2008.

The U.S. Census bureau is scheduled to release new estimates on Tuesday.