"...payments are direct from patient to medical provider, and so prices are constrained by what the market will directly bear. " This nice gross oversimplifica

"...payments are direct from patient to medical provider, and so prices are constrained by what the market will directly bear. " This nice gross oversimplification is how, maybe, it was envisioned in the 1960s when we should have fixed it, but bears no resemblance to how it actually works today.