alt Hacker News> the supplier (doctor) has an information asymmetry and thus makes most of the decisions, while the buyer (patient) is not usually the payer (insurance) so aren’t really incentivized to save
Counterfactual: patients in India routinely shop around for second opinions and negotiate fees.
Completely fair point. I should have prefaced my statement with US based healthcare system is structured this way. I don't know how the dynamics are in other countries -- though I do suspect it's similar in term of information asymmetry. I imagine doctors everywhere have some pretty advanced and specialized knowledge. I don't know enough about India to know how they overcome this issue or if they do or not.