A new study from Yale School of Medicine has found health care company payouts favor shareholders and are increasing the cost of health care for Americans.
Study co-author Cary Gross, who is a professor of medicine and public health at YSM, said they looked at 92 large health care companies for their study and were surprised at the level of shareholder payout by them.
“Nineteen companies accounted for 80% of all of the shareholder payouts,” Gross said. “Some of the largest were, for instance, within the pharma world. Pfizer directed $360 billion in shareholder payouts back to the shareholders. United Healthcare has over $100 billion, and Hospital Corporation of America has over $89 billion. Each of those greater than the annual NIH budget.”
Gross said that of the $5 trillion spent by the United States on healthcare in 2023, 70% was funded in some form by taxpayer money to healthcare companies. According to Gross, not only is the for-profit health care sector returning huge profits, but the non-profit side is as well.
“It’s fair to say the not-for-profit sector within the healthcare system also bears some of the blame,” Gross said. “Some of these large academic centers also become local conglomerates, which can increase cost and decrease competition. But nothing compares to the large national conglomerates, and we’re talking about hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue.”
Over the past 20 years, shareholder payouts have tripled, but the same amount of money has not been reinvested into the health care system by for-profit companies, the study found.
