This happens because the easy ways to win are not by coming up with something new and better, but by colluding, fixing prices, skimping on services or quality, deceiving customers, and other tricks of sharp sellers. Competition seems so foreign to health care. In commercial life, the law of the land is caveat emptor , let the buyer beware . In health care, the law of the land is confidat emptor , let the buyer trust . Patients go to doctors because when they are hurting, scared or anxious they want an expert they can trust to put their interests first.
Markets here are a paradigm misfit.
No other nation with an advanced health care system has embraced competition, and no other nation has turned its services over to investors seeking profits. Nevertheless, American business executives and politicians have aggressively promoted the transformation of health care into commercial competitive markets. Furthermore, up until 1999, they declared that this transformation was completely successful in halting years of escalating costs. In fact, about a third of the slowdown in health care costs was due to the general slowdown in overall inflation rates. Another third was due to cutbacks in services offered by health insurance.