My wife and I will be part of America’s Halloween tradition. We’ll take the kids around the neighborhood, act like we don’t recognize each kid who “scares” us. If we’re feeling nostalgic for Halloween, we’ll always have the Big Pharma ads, with the Halloween mask of deception that never seems to come off.
It’s an effective mask, too, backed by hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising and lobbying, and support from politicians nationwide. The companies that take billions from taxpayers to make tens of billions more will tell you that they have to charge big prices to Americans because, without it, we won’t have all of the medications upon which we have come to rely.
My wife and I are teachers who prioritize healthy lifestyles for ourselves and our children. We also ensure everyone is vaccinated each fall against the flu and all the major illnesses. This balanced perspective allows us to see through the many layers of the Big Pharma façade.
For example, Americans spend nearly three times as much on prescription drugs as people in other wealthy nations. The same medication that costs $30 overseas can cost hundreds here. Big Pharma says that it’s only trying to make up profit lost in other nations that have negotiated lower prices. However, pharma’s profits aren’t being reinvested in better prices; instead, they are allocated to executive bonuses, stock buybacks, and lobbying.
And it’s a lot of lobbying. Recent data show the pharmaceutical and health-products industry is on track to spend well in excess of $400 million in 2025, more than any other industry in America. The pharmaceutical trade association also spent the third-most of any such organization in 2024. That money isn’t being used to lower prices or create more access for families. It’s meant to lock in a business model against competition, oversight and transparency.
All this to say we’re paying twice — once for the tens of billions of taxpayer dollars that fund research into drugs and then again with higher prices.
Remember, Big Pharma is the victim; it’s only trying to help us.
Which brings us to the biggest monster of all: American culture, where the industry’s relentless advertising and social-media campaigns have trained Americans to view medications not as a last resort but as a first reflex.
Stressed? There’s a pill. Anxious? Ask your doctor.
Being healthy used to mean sleeping enough, eating right and moving more, and if you were deficient in one of the three, doubling up on the other two was the cure. Now it means popping a prescription and hoping the price doesn’t double before your next refill.
From an economic viewpoint, it’s a near-perfect setup: customers can’t opt out, the government subsidizes research, and demand never ends. This isn’t free enterprise — it’s dependence. And ironically, it’s not even serving the interests of pharmaceutical investors well. The drug industry’s publicly traded companies have grown less than 70 percent as well as the overall S&P 500 market, since 2020.
Like the final act of a Halloween movie, the monster doesn’t vanish — it simply changes its form. The system that claims to save lives is quietly profiting from illnesses, lobbying to silence competition, and convincing us that medicine is the only path to wellness.
The good news is that the spell is wearing off. One of the few benefits of the COVID-19 pandemic was highlighting how much of the pharmaceutical industry prioritizes profits over patients. For example, major companies were given immunity from lawsuits if their COVID-19 shots and mandates harmed people — convenient for them but not for those whose hearts took a hit. The Food and Drug Administration required related warnings earlier this year, despite studies showing the risks at least three years ago.
The pharmaceutical industry will always play the victim, and it has the power and influence to keep Phrankenstein’s monster moving. However, if a million families can pull the mask off, perhaps the country will see how Big Pharma has been handing out treats that are expensive, unhealthy and unnecessary.