The free market solution to this seems to be making it easy / easier for competitors to arise. Then, when private equity does this, the customers, and workers, just hop ship to a competitor that's better managed and the original clinic goes under.

I don't expect this happens in reality though. In general the things that happen in a healthy free market are NOT happening in our society.

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yoyohello13 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

This completely discounts the work involved to find service providers you trust. I spent a long time finding a Doctor I trust, finding a Vet I trust, etc. I don't want a "free market" solution where I need to switch providers every 6 months because some rich dude is being a dick.

This is the problem with so many market focused solutions. They discount the burden put on the consumer.

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rootusrootus 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

If the market is healthy, there will already be two or three providers in town instead of one that has any sort of monopoly, and the LBO won't be lucrative to begin with.

	▲	sarchertech 34 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Unless the PE firm comes in and buys up all of the vet practices in town (or enough of them), which is a tactic they like to employ.

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Buttons840 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You're complaining about healthcare being tied to employment. That sucks. Yeah, we should get rid of that.

Coupling healthcare and employment makes it harder for agents to move and trade "freely" in the "free market".

So, I say again. The things that happen in a healthy free market are not happening in our society.

	▲	sarchertech 33 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		The original poster was talking about vets, which don’t have that issue.

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s1artibartfast 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I think the idea is that you'd have to switch less often.

People can scam you and jerk you around because you don't have options.

If you had options, they might be less inclined

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WalterBright 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A business owner lamented to me recently that it wasn't the taxes that were crushing his business, but the costly regulations that keep on coming.

The harder the government makes it to operate a business, the less businesses there will be.

	▲	joquarky 3 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		One alternative is to educate the population so that regulations are less necessary. But having an educated population has become unpopular.

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ambicapter an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Free markets are a fiction, the real world contains a lot of friction.