[peyton]

That’s an opinion from an economist along with prior behavior, not reality. I’ve talked to one of the guys who worked on the ACA, and his take was basically providers will do things like e.g. buy up all the cardiologists in an area, then jack up prices across the board. Employers need to provide a certain bundle of services under the ACA. That’s where people are taking advantage.

[supertrope]

They’re locked into a red queen race. Providers merge to gain scale and negotiation power. Insurers merge to gain scale and negotiation power. The ACA encouraged scaling up to drive down unit costs, but it just resulted in companies scaling up to protect their margins.