Can the Cooperative Model Help America’s Healthcare System?

Cooperatives are often formed in reaction to a marketplace “failure.” For example, if in a certain industry a monopoly provider maintains high prices for essential services, or for-profit companies simply fail to provide essential services for economic reasons, cooperatives can enter the industry and give their members access to such services at reasonable prices. In this way the cooperative model has been essential to the full development of certain industries. Perhaps this is why Congress considered the use of health-care cooperatives during the health reform debate. Critics immediately argued that the cooperative model was unworkable. AHC attorneys Roland Hall and Charles Autry explain how the cooperative model might remedy some of America’s health-care woes. The article discusses common criticisms of, and counter-arguments to, the use of health-care cooperatives. Feel free to post your thoughts, reactions, and comments.