What constitutes fair compensation to physicians under Medicare? Medicare now pays physicians 80 percent of a predetermined charge for a particular service, and the consumer pays the rest, but radical changes have been proposed. Alarmed at the rising costs of Medicare, Congress is seeking ways to control these expenditures. Contributors to this book evaluate the deeply flawed but politically popular proposal that would, in effect, impose price controls on many medical procedures. Leading experts on physician markets and health insurance consider the competition in the market for physicians' services, the value of surgeons' time in comparison with the time of primary care physicians, the conflicting ideologies regarding access to medical care, the taxation or prohibition of Medigap insurance, and the relationship of doctors' fees to access to care.

Contributors: H. E. Frech III, Joseph R. Antos, David Dranove, Mark A. Satterthwaite, Frank A. Sloan, Lee Benham, Peter Zweifel, Jack Hadley, Charles E. Phelps, Clark C. Havighurst, Stephen Zuckerman, John Holahan, Jesse S. Hixson, Thomas G. McGuire, Janet B. Mitchell, Jerry Cromwell, Margo L. Rosenbach, William B. Stason, William C. Hsiao, Daniel L. Dunn, Joel Ira Franck, Glenn T. Hammons, Finis Welch, William D. Marder, Richard J. Willke, Jody L. Sindelar, Mark V. Pauly, James B. Ramsey, David C. Colby, David A. Juba, Roger A. Reynolds, Paul B. Ginsburg, Joseph P. Newhouse, Roger G. Noll, James F. Rodgers, Robert A. Berenson, Robin Allen, Glenn M. Hackbarth