Why Not Better and Cheaper?: Healthcare and Innovation

Why doesn't healthcare get better and cheaper like the cell phones we carry in our pockets? In this book, James B. Rebitzer and Robert S. Rebitzer argue that it's because the healthcare system generates the wrong kinds of innovation. Further, they show that incentive contracts, professional norms, social narratives, and the nature of competition and disruption in the health sector conspire against cost-reducing innovation. The book not only sheds new light on the trajectory of innovation in healthcare, but it also highlights how we can point innovation in a better direction to deliver more value to patients and society.

James B. Rebitzer is the Peter and Deborah Wexler Professor of Management at Boston University's Questrom School of Business where he was founding chair of the department of Markets, Public Policy, and Law. Formerly, he was the Mannix Professor of Healthcare Finance and Economics and Chair of the Economics Department at the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western University. He is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and a research fellow at the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). He has received The Health Care Research Award from the National Institute of Health Care Management and the Kenneth J. Arrow Award from the International Health Economics Association.

Robert S. Rebitzer is a senior advisor at Manatt Health and a Distinguished Career Institute Fellow at Stanford University. Formerly, he was a partner in the healthcare strategy practice of Accenture and a Vice President of UnitedHealth Group. He has also served as an advisor to the California Healthcare Foundation and to Stanford University's Clinical Excellence Research Center. He is currently chairman of the board of El Camino Health System.