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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony

• twoodfin 9y ago
  The U.S. military has essentially a monopsony on high-tech weapons systems like the F-35, but somehow it doesn't see great efficiencies in pricing.
• CWuestefeld 9y ago
  Pasting a link with no words is a cheap reply. If you can't spend the time to actually formulate an argument, it's hardly worth the time to reply to you. Your implication is that because they're the only buyer, sellers will be forced to fall into line. That's not applicable in this situation, for the very same reasons that the bill's proponents claim that a free market system doesn't work. For the negotiation that you're implying to work, it has to involve the possibility that the potential buyer could say "no" and walk away. In this case, it's not going to happen. There's just no way the government can say no to, e.g., a revolutionary treatment for AIDS - the political constituencies simply won't let it happen. So what we'll be left with is: - Treatments for maladies involving well-organized constituencies will get disproportionately better coverage. So AIDS or breast cancer will have much better care than, say, colon cancer. - The choices in these negotiations will be made by those hyperbolic "death panels". Yes, the GOP were exaggerating a lot, but when it comes down to it, somebody has to decide where finite resources will be spent. Somebody in the government is going to be deciding if your affliction is the one that gets left on the negotiating table in order to close the deal.