Concerned about the high prices of prescription drugs? Think big government solutions will help? Think again.
More evidence from this article that a competitive marketplace leads to lower prices, even in the health care field.
"The Labor Department recently reported that the inflation rate for prescription drugs dropped to 1 percent over the past year. That’s a 30-year low, well below inflation, and a salve for consumers used to price increases."
The reason for this consumer-friendly news? Competition. Part of it coming from an infusion of generic drugs:
"In the past 18 months, for example, generic substitutes for the anti-cholesterol drug Zocor, the sleeping pill Ambien and the blood pressure drug Norvasc have arrived on the market."
Seems that once a patent expires, those evil pharmaceutical companies driven by their greedy profit motives compete to provide those in need with drugs at ever-decreasing prices.
Moreover, most of the restraint on prescription drug prices comes from good old healthy competition.
"Even as generic-drug competition has suppressed prices, the price war among drug retailers has compounded the savings for consumers. Last year, Wal-Mart began offering hundreds of commonly used generics for a flat $4 fee. Target followed, and then K-mart expanded its own offerings, featuring three-month supplies of several generics for $15. Publix, a Southeastern grocery chain, seemingly outdid everyone by announcing that seven antibiotics would be free."
Did that just say free antibiotics?
"Remember this, what real competition looks like, the next time you hear about "market failures" in health care."
And just imagine how much cheaper drugs would be for Americans if the government wasn’t subsidizing the drug industry with billions of taxpayer dollars.
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