Hospital prices represent the most significant driver of healthcare costs, accounting for 44 percent of all dollars spent on healthcare. In the last 15 years, hospitals prices have risen 100 percent compared with 40 to 50 percent for housing and food. And, despite these massive price increases, high hospital prices do not guarantee higher-quality care. The unnecessarily high increases in hospital prices not only impact working people’s access to affordable care but also squeeze their wages. SEIU 32BJ, for example, estimates that if healthcare costs had increased at the rate of inflation from 2014 to 2023, an additional $5,000 in annual wages would have been available for union members. High hospital prices also waste taxpayers’ money. By paying hospital prices that are above Medicare’s rates (an objective fair-pricing benchmark), New York City may be overpaying by as much as $2 billion. At the same time, private hospitals receive hundreds of millions of dollars in property tax exemptions from the city each year. For this coalition, reining in out-of-control hospital prices isn’t a choice; it’s a necessity. We must protect workers’ access to affordable, high-quality healthcare without squeezing their wages. We must demand lower hospital prices.