Post #51198 by albaby1 on the US Policy board

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It does matter, for a very simple reason. The doctor (or the practice) agrees to perform a variety of specific procedures at a fixed price for each procedure. As these prices are not public information (IMO, they should be), this means the healthcare patient can not shop for treatment at real prices--only artificially HIGH prices.

Fair enough, but that doesn't really change the analysis. My point is that we pay a lot more for health care - the prices we pay for the actual health care - than in other countries. That very well may be because of lack of shopping, which gives the doctors a lot of pricing power over consumers. But regardless, it won't change if we switch to a single-payer system unless the federal government is willing to go to all those doctors and hospitals and whomever and tell them that they're now going to get paid a lot less. Which simply isn't going to happen.

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