Healthcare Hullabaloo: George Carlin

I love oxymorons – two words that are commonly used together but are contradictory in nature. The late, great George Carlin compiled an ever growing list of these couplets, and he would often share them with his audience.

Here are some classic oxymorons:

Jumbo Shrimp
Military Intelligence
Approximately Equal
Constant Change
Industrial Park
Live Recording

Here's some more from the master oxymoronist himself:

Fortunately for oxymoron lovers, the list of these illogical couplets continues to grow. The latest addition to the list comes from our old friends at California Blue Cross/Blue Shield.

I’ve been critical of this company in past blogs, and much of that criticism was the result of their outrageous unfounded rate increases over the past few years. I’m not alone in my disdain for this profiteering company – their rate increases have spawned outrage among their subscribers, journalists, and even the US Congress.

Recently, with their hat in hand, California BC/BS has had a much needed change of heart and has graciously (sic) decided to roll back their rates and even refund some money to their beleaguered subscribers. In addition, California BC/BS CEO Bruce Bodaken has announced that the company will limit its annual net income to no more than 2 percent of revenue.

While this might sound fantastic to some people, to me it just raises a bigger question. You see, California BC/BS is a not-for-profit company,. So what’s all of this talk about income? Isn’t net income just another way of saying profit?

So we have ourselves a new oxymoron – not-for-profit profit.

In addition, the entire press release made no mention of reducing expenditures in order to make their insurance more affordable – they can continue to spend and waste vast sums of money, so long as the ‘net’ profit remains at 2%

Case in point: The top earner at Blue Shield of California was Chief Executive Bodaken, who made $4.6 million last year — which is just a tad more then what you could make flipping burgers at Carl’s Junior. Pundits might argue that his salary is in line with what other insurance executives are making – but they would be wrong. Bodaken’s take home pay was more than four times the salary of his closest counterpart, the CEO if California’s largest for-profit insurer, Anthem Blue Cross.

So the real bottom line here is the same as it is with many other health insurance companies: “Not-for-profit” REALLY means “Not-for-shareholder-profit”. The people who are running these companies are profiting quite nicely from their positions. And the people who are buying their inflated policies and financing their bloated salaries and wasteful spending (like you and I) continue to let them do so.

Which makes all of us Oxymorons. Hold the Oxy.

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