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The Only Prescription Is More Transparency

NPR

Healthcare is a giant part of the economy, and a huge drain on the public purse. More than a quarter of federal government spending goes to healthcare, which makes it a very political issue.

President Trump has stated his intention to create a more consumer friendly healthcare system... more market-based. Part of that is increasing price transparency for prescription drugs and medical procedures.

One move might be to post the prices of certain medical procedures online, with a view to having a truly competitive market drive prices lower. Mark Maffett of the University of Chicago's Booth School talked to us about a study his team did of markets where this is already happening.

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Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Cardiff Garcia is a co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money podcast, along with Stacey Vanek Smith. He joined NPR in November 2017.
Stacey Vanek Smith is the co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money. She's also a correspondent for Planet Money, where she covers business and economics. In this role, Smith has followed economic stories down the muddy back roads of Oklahoma to buy 100 barrels of oil; she's traveled to Pune, India, to track down the man who pitched the country's dramatic currency devaluation to the prime minister; and she's spoken with a North Korean woman who made a small fortune smuggling artificial sweetener in from China.
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