Hospitals and the Insurance industry need an overhaul. Given 90% of American citizens have some kind of insurance why do hospitals have a 2 system billing in place where those who don’t have insurance pay half of what insurance is billed? Every hospital and doctor have a pre-priced agreement with every insurance company they accept. Yet they Bill the insurance company ten to twenty times the agreed upon rate – only to be paid the agreed upon rate. What’s the point?
I just got a bill date from 2023. When I looked it up on my insurance, this bill plus a number of others were pending review due to ‘double charging’. And it was NOT my responsibility to pay. So, essentially the hospital had decided to try and get the double billed amount out of me! A friend was sent a bill for an ambulance. He noticed they hadn’t submitted it to insurance. The bill was for $600. When he informed them of the insurance the bill was doubled to $1200.
YET – it’s the doctors and hospitals who make the claim that billing is costing them a huge portion of their revenues… Actually, it’s not. It’s the funny billing making insurance companies crazy. So what do hospitals now do to mitigate? They create different codes for the same procedure to attempt to FOOL insurance and get paid 2 to 3 times.
United Healthcare Group had record revenue for 2024, but profits fell not from operating expenses – but “Other”. As in the multiple lawsuits paid and pending. Claims denials, underpayment of providers, insider trading, breach of contract and medicare advantage plan fraud.
The current CEO of United since 2021 is Sir Andrew Witty, a British executive formerly CEO of GlaxoSmithKlein. He stepped down from the pharma position amidst criticism he was NOT doing a good job. Not a stellar resume notation. His total compensation in 2023 was $23.5 million. The healthcare debacle is not confined to the US.
Medicare and Medicaid were spun off in the 1960’s. Since then the system has continued to deteriorate and the price inflation continues unabated. Of course the biggest difference comes from Medicaid given it is a welfare program financed from nothing. Medicare, like Social Security, is financed by taxpayers. Managed by the government. Its failure is in the level of management given the funds are considered ‘revenue’ on the government’s books.
Therefore, every dime we give the government for Medicare is spent on ‘Other’. The bookkeeper’s wasteland. Like SS, Medicare funds are used to buy US Treasury’s earning 1-4% interest. As I have noted before, Government Pensions are invested in the stock market – earning 5% to 30%.
Medicare is paid for through 2 trust fund accounts held by the U.S. Treasury. These funds can only be used for Medicare. Hospital Insurance (HI) Trust Fund. Problem. These Trust Fund accounts do not show up in the US Treasury Balance Sheet as a liability. Instead, ALL outstanding T-Bills, Notes, and Bonds are lumped together with interest rates of 5.2%, 2.7% and 3.2%. Because the interest rates are so low, Medicare and SS can never catchup to inflation. Thus for the last 60 years inflation has outpaced our retirement services to the point that the liability for ALL government loans due back to citizens, states, corporations, and country’s is now $27.7 Trillion. Not including interest. The second largest debt on the Treasury’s books is “Federal Employee and Veterans Benefits”. The largest categories within these include $5.7 Trillion in Pensions and $7.2 trillion in Veteran compensation. Of all the categories within this designation, the sum total is a liability of $15Trillion.
In common bankruptcy proceedings, when a person can no longer pay their debt, the assets are seized. The government owns 640 million acres of land valued at $1.8 Trillion according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Other Assets on the books include Loans Receivable whose largest actuarial is ‘student debt’ at $1.37 Trillion. So when Biden was writing off student loans he was growing the unsustainable debt that is now $45.5 Trillion on assets of just $5.6 Trillion. These number are all sourced from the US Treasury Departments Financial Statements FYE 2024.
How is GDP measured in the US? GDP is the ‘value’ of all goods and services produced. That means that inflation will actually increase the GDP, when prices come down and everything else is static – the GDP would be lower. Meaning GDP growth is a misnomer because the means of measurement is based on forever inflation! For Example: IF we pay less for eggs and gas now vs under Biden – then GDP would drop.
Within that measure is also the ‘services’ produced. When employment is low – the services criteria would raise GDP. So if you have 20 million farmer pickers coming into the US that would artificially raise GDP.
And then there is the final Fatal Flaw – everything thrown into the pot creating a fantastical number is an ESTIMATE. And those estimates come from the Bureau of Economic Analysis as headed by Vipin Arora within the Department of Commerce.
The BEA Advisory Committee was tasked with advising the Director, Vipin. As of February 28, 2025, the Committee was ‘terminated’.