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by spaetzleesser 1456 days ago
The hospital determines a price and offers it to all comers. Most businesses work that way.
2 comments

I don't think it would work well. Hospitals are not a free market in most of the US. You have to get a Certificate of Need to set up a new one. Given the near monopoly they have in the local area, regulation is probably going to be required if nobody gets to negotiate.
Why can't a hospital charge the same price for the same procedure? I can see that different hospitals may charge different prices from each other. But a single hospital should charge the same no matter if uninsured, insured or whatever.
What is to stop the local hospital from deciding that an appendectomy costs a million dollars? You pay, insurance pays, no matter, is is a million bucks.
If they want to, they should do it, publish the price and see how things go.
The only business that works that way is retail. And even then most will negotiate on bulk orders. Almost everyone else will have a price list they negotiate off of.
As far as a patient goes, a hospital is retail.