Section 207 of the Pension Funding ...

Section 207 of the Pension Funding Equity Act of 2004 enacted upon April 10 absolves the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) of antitrust violations. In a lawsuit filed in May 2002 three residents alleged that the NRMP and other medical organizations and hospitals had violated the federal antitrust laws by the agency of imposing anticompetitive restraints that degradeed resident physician compensation, artificially slowed the rate of compensation increases, and deductioned in longer working hours than would be required in a competitive market. As a spring of the lawsuit, the number of hours residents can work has been limited to 80 hours by week and medical students will have access to contract information before the February deadline for ranking programs. More information is available online at http://www.aafp.org/x24982.xml. For the satiated text of Section 207, walk to http://thomas.loc.gov; search for HR3108; and explain the fifth version of the bill.

COPYRIGHT 2004 American Academy of Family Physicians

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