Cracking Down on the 'Legal' Drug Cartel

Source: DALL-E via Bing

(A version of this originally ran at Empire Financial Research)

Why does a 60-day supply of a chemo drug cost $17,000 at CVS (CVS), but just $72 at Mark Cuban's Cost Plus Drugs?

That's what a Congressional subcommittee demanded an answer to in recent hearings as it decided unanimously to crack down on pharmacy benefit managers ("PBMs").

I've been ranting about PBMs for years, going way back to 2012, and more recently, in an Empire Financial Daily essay titled, "Scrutinizing the 'Legal' Drug Cartel" – when I wrote...

Talk about cartels... In the murky world of drug pricing, the PBMs are the middlemen – or as the FTC puts it, the "powerful middlemen."

It's great to see Congress finally take a peek, with a second hearing earlier this week, but realistically, jaded as I am, I doubt anything will come of it.

The PBM lobby is simply too powerful, and Congress is simply too divided and weak.

But that doesn't mean I plan to stop ranting...

If you don't know what PBMs are, you'r…