| > Companies like Intuit have lobbied an industry into existence, and boy oh boy it's lucrative. Nearly every public facing industry lobbies Congress to protect their industries at the expense of the USA citizen. One of the worst offenders is the US drug industry. In Australia, our government can buy the exact same US drugs at a 79% to 306% (the average is 149%) discount to what American citizens have to pay. This only happens because or government barters with these pharmaceutical companies and gets a massive volume discount. Thanks to Congress, these exact same volume discounts are not allowed and in fact there are laws in place that forbid the US government asking for any form of volume discount. This means USA citizens pay way over the full price for their prescription drugs, thanks to restrictive laws designed to hurt the US citizen and protect these companies. Biden finally managed to force Congress's hand and soon the US government will be allowed to barter for a better price, but he only managed to get a change that happens in 2026. For the next two years American citizen will still be getting ripped off by these drug companies. What is worse, most of the America population doesn't even realize Biden managed to bring about these changes, and no doubt should the GOP win in 2024 there's a chance those law changes might be reversed. I have a good idea which candidates these drug companies will be supporting in 2024. |
It’s been a weird change to watch. For most of my life it’s been my left wing and / or hippie friends who were super skeptical of the drug industry. Today, it’s a tossup between them and my right wing friends as to who is more anti big-pharma.