> not an argument that the US should pay less overall for drugs than poorer countries.
I never said that.
My point is simply that pointing at nominal GDP paints an inaccurate picture. The US is a complex and extremely heterogenous market, and using a single economic measure to justify nationwide pricing is a bit like taking the temperature average of the man whose head is in the oven and feet in the freezer.
It's feasible to imagine a world in which drug companies apply the same adjusted pricing to poorer segments of the US market as they do foreign customers. They don't in practice, allegedly, because of Medicaid regulations enforcing a lowest-in-country price [1]. Regardless of whether that particular explanation holds water, the idea of price discrimination within the highly unequal US market is reasonable.
That's about funding though right? And now about how much the individual state programs pay for things (like prescription drugs). In the end does it work out to be the same thing? Maybe? I'm uncertain.
Critical access hospitals and rural health clinics probably overlap too, where Medicare pays out to smaller qualifying facilities using a different formula.
I never said that.
My point is simply that pointing at nominal GDP paints an inaccurate picture. The US is a complex and extremely heterogenous market, and using a single economic measure to justify nationwide pricing is a bit like taking the temperature average of the man whose head is in the oven and feet in the freezer.
It's feasible to imagine a world in which drug companies apply the same adjusted pricing to poorer segments of the US market as they do foreign customers. They don't in practice, allegedly, because of Medicaid regulations enforcing a lowest-in-country price [1]. Regardless of whether that particular explanation holds water, the idea of price discrimination within the highly unequal US market is reasonable.
[1] https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/serials/files/r...