UnitedHealth Group commissioned Milliman to analyze the value to the federal government of the Medicare Advantage (MA) program relative to traditional Medicare for 2026. This is an update to a prior analysis that studied 2025. We estimated the value of the MA program to the government by calculating the average government spending for MA beneficiaries, compared with average government spending for traditional Medicare beneficiaries.
Topics discussed included the following:
- Government spending per-member-per-month for Traditional Medicare versus MA
- Distribution of government spending for Traditional Medicare versus MA
- Additional MA benefits provided through Part C rebates
- Total government and beneficiary spending for Traditional Medicare versus MA
This report was commissioned by UnitedHealth Group.