Prescription drug rebates are payments for position in formulary markets. The focus of this paper is the bases required to assign positions so as to minimize total expected benefit costs. We develop a linear assignment model of an “immature” therapeutic class market where there is...

Following the generally accepted theories of the legal scholar Robert Bork and his Chicago School colleagues, vertical restraints such as exclusive dealing contracts are presumptively procompetitive and welfare-enhancing because it would be irrational for a buyer to exclude the lowest cost...

Systemic problems with mortgage loan operations -- originations and modifications -- are flows which are capitalized into a long-dated assets or stocks. Correcting bad origination practices, or changing the flows, does not change the prior stocks created by the flows. There were systemic...

The purpose of this paper is to review a late 2014 non-consolidation decision of The Bancorp (NASDAQ:TBBK), a Philadelphia area bank with a diversified loan portfolio, but also known for being one of largest issuers of reloadable prepaid debit and gift cards in the country.Based on detail...

Carpooling is now seen as last big opportunity to grow a shared mobility as a service (MaaS) business ahead of the arrival of autonomous vehicles (AVs). We present the case that Waze’s altruistic vision of carpooling is insufficient to scale the business. Our transactional vision of the...

The purpose of this paper is to present the case that the difference in profitability between Wellpoint's PBM business and other PBM operations stems more from differences in business models than from differences in the efficiency of operations. And Express Scripts is paying a premium for...

The business model of large Independent pharmacy benefits managers (PBMs) are in stark contrast to the rest of the healthcare cost containment industry in that their revenue model features opaque transactional margins from captive suppliers subsidizing transparent management fees. Updating our...

On September 6, 2005, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released a long awaited study of potential conflicts of interest by independent pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs). Like any good study of alleged wrongdoing, the FTC examined both motive and performance.The FTC's analysis indicated that it...

The roll out of the new Medicare drug benefit program has renewed the debate about who is best at negotiating drug rebates with pharmaceutical manufacturers (“Pharma”). Those who favor the Federal government point to statistics showing that Medicaid gets significantly better rebates than...