Doctors' contracts: For life or subject to renewal?

In the British National Health Service and most other health care systems the medical market place, in particular the terms and conditions of the doctors’ contract, is highly regulated. In the UK, for instance, a powerful monopoly organisation, the British Medical Association, seeks to ensure tenure and a high rate of return over the life cycle to a largely publicly financed investment in medical education by doctors. A potentially powerful monopsony (sole buyer) organisation, the Department of Health and Social Security seeks, often weakly for fear of political (electoral) consequences, to hold down the price paid for a doctors' services and thereby contain the costs of the NHS.