Fijar o no fijar precios... he ahí el dilema

Antitrust laws make unlawful any agreements among competitors that directly or indirectly restrain competition, including agreements among competitors which directly or indirectly affect prices. [/unquote]





Then, in this case, perhaps what\'s needed is a good movement to derogate the antitrust laws.



\"Antitrust\" indeed in most cases is a euphemism for \"antiprofessionalism\". Let\'s not get confused: antitrust laws don\'t prevent price fixing: the laws just transfer the deed of price fixing to a 3rd party. This 3rd party is, astoundingly, never elected by the professionals regulated by them. The professionals are after all the ones who epitomize the knowledge or \"know how\" in their field, and who are usually liable for any errors.



These parasite 3rd party entities, justified by both the antitrust laws and an amazing complacency of the common citizen, take upon themselves the matter of fixing prices for the services provided by the true professionals.



How are these parasite entities manned?



Mostly -sometimes entirely- by people who have no professional training in the matters they set out to regulate. Example: in Medicine, health insurance companies often hire employees and administrators who can barely speak English -or any other language. Health Insurance administrators cannot usually distinguish between, say, an ultravascular ultrasound and a colonoscopy, much less understand what set of skills is needed for each. Yet these administrators decide how much a doctor will be compensated / reimbursed for a procedure or consultation.



Such compensations for medical services are often laughable. For ex. a dual-chamber pacemaker implantation, with all the risks and time that it involves, plus all the knowledge it requires (of surgical techniques and of correctly programming a pacemaker by a someone who trained as a doctor + Cardiologist + Electrophysiologist) is reimbursed at an average rate of about 380$. This rate is about the same that a self-paid patient pays to a Dermatologist or Plastic Surgeon to receive a Botox injection to decrease facial wrinkles -- - a 10-minute procedure. (The Botox is billed separately, at 400$ per vial.) The Plastic Surgeon fee, of course, is rarely -if ever- negotiable. It is paid by patients because the same high price will be charged by the next Plastic Surgeon, and their right to charge the same high price on the grounds that antitrust laws are being infringed is challenged by nobody.



Examples like this abound in all areas of professional life, and I\'m sure that each ProZ member could provide their own example.



Returning to the fee-for-services that US insurance companies pay to doctors, more often than not, the customer -i.e., the patient- has paid for his/her procedure many times over throughout his/her years as an insured employee. Now, where could all that money be going... let\'s think.....



Who do we think medical insurance companies compare to, in the translation world?.



It is true that insurance companies connect doctors with patients, and that agencies connect translators with clients in need of translations. Their middle-man services should certainly be compensated. From there, though, to blindly accept pre-fixed rates which are lower than we think it\'s fair.... rates determined by people who have sometimes not even finished high school....and have no understanding of the services they\'re capping... only because we must abide by antitrust laws that in their zeal to break trusts & monopolies also prevent professionals from establishing their own fair prices....?





My opinion:



Antitrust laws and their peculiar interpretation / enforcement shouldn\'t intimidate us. In many areas of Medical care, primary doctors and specialists are right now spearheading joint efforts to lobby & appeal to Congress to return power to the doctors and nurses when it comes to setting fair reimbursement rates for services. One such example is NASPE (North American Society of Electrophysiology and Pacing), which has been lobbying before Congress for over 2 years.



Let\'s let the US antitrust laws serve the real purpose (that hopefully) they were passed for: to prevent monopolies, to foster free enterprise -but never at the expense of the people who have spent the most years studying and deserve the fair rewards of a job well done, i.e., the professionals of each discipline.



[Note: I hope to see my post published.... I want to believe that Proz is a bastion of free speech. Thanks Henry in advance.]







[ This Message was edited by: on 2002-05-15 22:17 ]

[ This Message was edited by: on 2002-05-16 13:35 ]