attempts to address pharmaceutical benefit managers, or PBMs. These entities negotiate drug prices on behalf of employers and insurers. But in recent years, some have questioned whether PBMs deliver good value for patients and health plans.
But because third parties — employers, insurers, or the government — pay for so much of our healthcare, the system’s end users frequently have little leverage to peek behind the proverbial curtain and understand how the system works. The same incentives that make PBMs’ business practices opaque also explain why individuals have such difficulty finding the prices of healthcare services when they can look up the price of virtually every other good or service online in an instant.
That provision points to a larger concern. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has stated his desire to bring a drug pricing package to the Senate floor in the coming months. And undoubtedly, Sanders and his leftist allies will push Schumer to craft the most aggressive legislation possible.