NOBODY PAYS LIST PRICE.

Part of the cost of medical insurance is the cost of obscuring the prices.  John "Grumpy Economist" Cochrane suggests that more trade-tested betterments, stat, will help a lot.  "The clearest sign of pathology in US health care is that the cash market is dead. Even if you have the money, you must have an insurer to negotiate the 'insurance discount.'" That insurance discount, of course, is a fiction based on a fictional list price so as to make the patient feel better about having the insurance, or something. But it's a fiction. "It allows hospitals to declare lots of charity care when they treat uninsured people with no money at all. But more importantly, it gives them a great starting point for a one-on-one ex-post negotiation for the unwary."

I learned something about those posted prices in hotel rooms.  Apparently, that's consumer protection legislation, a guest can never pay more than the rate posted on the door, which is generally several times the Best Available Rate, even if you're an occasional traveler not taking advantage of a convention rate or a rewards program or the baseball team being out of town.  But clinics and hospitals don't even have to post those rates.  "It's easy to post phony prices and wink that nobody actually pays that price. Hospitals already do that when forced to disclose by stating huge prices and then offering insurers bundle discounts separated from the individual bill."