The Distributional Implications of Itemized Medical Deductions

Approximately $76 billion in out-of-pocket medical spending was deducted as an itemized medical deduction in 2021, resulting in about $9 billion in federal forgone tax revenue. We use data from US tax returns to examine how these tax savings are distributed across income and age, how the distributions differ from the mortgage interest deduction, and how the distributions changed with the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Although a given level of medical spending is less likely to be above the income threshold for higher-income households, itemization rates and marginal tax rates increase with income, resulting in tax savings skewed toward higher-income taxpayers: 94% of the tax savings accrue to those in the top half of the income distribution. The tax savings are also highly concentrated at older ages, with 42% accruing to those over age 65. Using rich survey data on out-of-pocket medical spending, we illustrate how the distribution of tax savings varies across policy alternatives. We find that expanding eligibility for the tax subsidy would likely reduce the concentration of tax savings at higher incomes and increase the concentration of tax benefits at older ages.