Jung v. Association of American Medical Colleges

The anti-trust class-action lawsuit Jung v. AAMC alleged collusion to prevent American trainee doctors from negotiating for better working conditions. The working conditions of medical residents often involved 80- to 100-hour workweeks. The suit had some early success, but failed when the U.S. Congress enacted a statute exempting matching programs from federal anti-trust laws.

Every year, American medical students and graduates participate along with foreign-trained physicians in a national matching plan to obtain a position in an accredited resident training program. Applicants and programs that participate in the matching plan submit rank-ordered preferences for training. A mathematical algorithm is used to place an applicant in a preferred program that also prefers the applicant.

The National Resident Matching Program, also referred to as "The Match", is one of several national matching plans in the United States.

The suit was launched on behalf of all current and former medical residents against defendants that oversaw and participated in the matching process as well as institutions that employed medical residents.

The three physicians who launched the suit alleged that the NRMP Matching program was an anti-competitive practice, claiming that:

The defendants challenged the admissibility of the lawsuit with several arguments, including a lack of jurisdiction and that the plaintiffs had not been injured. The court dismissed the cases against two defendants for lack of jurisdiction, and three because the claims of conspiracy did not involve them. The federal district court did allow the case to proceed against 17 defendants, ruling:

...the Court finds that plaintiffs adequately have alleged a common agreement to displace competition in the recruitment, hiring, employment and compensation of resident physicians and to impose a scheme of restraints that has the purpose and effect of fixing, artificially depressing, standardizing and stabilizing resident physician compensation and other terms of employment among certain defendants.

The lawsuit ended when Congress enacted legislation as a rider added to an unrelated bill (the Pension Funding Equity Act) that exempted participation in a matching program from federal anti-trust laws.

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