Nah. Plently of middlemen would be happy to arbitage a drug in canada that costs $20 and sell a million doses to Florida for $25. Aint no one gonna buy those million doses for the same $340 they can pay in the US.
Eventually, market forces will force the middleman to take a small profit at most, as they would be undercut by another middleman who would. Drug prices would pretty closely match at that point.
In a world of lots of small middlemen, sure. But in a world where you only have a handful of middlemen that can all collude with eachother to fix prices high? looks pointedly at several entire markets
Sure, you could have a cartel, but cartels only really work in industries that have very high barriers to entry, like oil production. Non-members have every incentive to undercut the cartel, and if it’s reasonably easy to enter the market, someone will do that.
It’s not particularly hard to buy stuff from Canada and re-sell it.
Nah. Plently of middlemen would be happy to arbitage a drug in canada that costs $20 and sell a million doses to Florida for $25. Aint no one gonna buy those million doses for the same $340 they can pay in the US.
Eventually, market forces will force the middleman to take a small profit at most, as they would be undercut by another middleman who would. Drug prices would pretty closely match at that point.
In a world of lots of small middlemen, sure. But in a world where you only have a handful of middlemen that can all collude with eachother to fix prices high? looks pointedly at several entire markets
Sure, you could have a cartel, but cartels only really work in industries that have very high barriers to entry, like oil production. Non-members have every incentive to undercut the cartel, and if it’s reasonably easy to enter the market, someone will do that.
It’s not particularly hard to buy stuff from Canada and re-sell it.
Any random stuff from Canada, yes. But as I understand it there are a few extra hoops at the border for large quantities of prescription medications.
That’s the beauty, they won’t have a choice. When it comes to pharma, the US is 110% anti-consumer.