 Since new hospitals cannot be constructed without proving a "need", the certificate-of-need system grants monopoly privileges to already existing hospitals.Consequently, Alaska House of Representatives member Bob Lynn has argued that the true motivation behind certificate-of-need legislation is that "large hospitals are... trying to make money by eliminating competition" under the pretext of using monopoly profits to provide better patient care.A 2011 study found that CONs "reduce the number of beds at the typical hospital by 12 percent, on average, and the number of hospitals per 100,000 persons by 48 percent.