Health-care costs expected to soar over next decade.

By Tony Pugh, Knight Ridder Washington Bureau Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

Feb. 24--WASHINGTON -- U.S. health-care spending will outpace overall inflation and wage growth over the next 10 years, making medical care harder for the government, employers, workers and uninsured Americans to afford.

The increases apply to federal spending and to private spending on health insurance premiums, the latter of which will grow faster than disposable income in each year through 2014, according to new projections released Wednesday by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Although the long-term national health spending growth rate will slow a bit compared with recent years, …