Kaiser Permanente: Failure to Thrive — A Managed Care Watch Web Site

Kaiser Permanente Thrive Exposed

September 7th, 2007 at 5:21 pm

Non-profit Kaiser earned more than DOUBLE the combined California proceeds of three for-profit health plans

[kaiserthrive.org's editor's note: Kaiser Hawaii is technically part of Kaiser California, so the statement that "Kaiser does not report numbers for California alone" is very telling. Since the Hawaii region had a net loss of $3.2 million so far this year, this means the California region made up for that deficit and still raked in more than double the combined total of Blue Cross, Health Net and PacifiCare in the first half of the year. Anyone still believe Kaiser Permanente is not for profit? If you answered yes, you might be interested in this really cool bridge we have for sale...]

From Sacramento Business Journal:

Kaiser reaps big profits for first half of year

Health giant out-earns for-profit HMOs

by Kathy Robertson
Staff writer

Kaiser Permanente earned more cash and had a higher profit margin in California than Blue Cross, Health Net and PacifiCare for the first half of the year, even though Kaiser is a nonprofit and the others are expected to earn money for their shareholders.

The Oakland-based HMO and healthcare system reported net income of $1.8 billion from operations in California and Hawaii, more than double the combined California proceeds at the three for-profit health plans, according to financial statements the companies filed with the state. Kaiser does not report numbers for California alone.

Greed
Image from connecting*the*dots

Update 9/9/07: A link to the full article has been posted in the comments.

8
  • 1

    Well, if we took our members money, provided a disservice
    by WITHOLDING CARE, we all would make quite a profit too.

    Wait a minute… I thought healthcare providers were in business
    to provide care, not reap a profit.

    Isn’t the government or anyone curious why this “non-profit” is
    reaping such a profit?

    Gee, how do they do that? How do they afford all of that
    expensive advertising? Where does all of this money come from?
    Why do we hear of so many horribly, bad things happening at kaiser
    to their paying members? Why is this continuing to be overlooked?

    So many questions, not enough answers.

    By the way, nice bridge! Has Kaiser put in an offer on that yet?

    Kaiser Victim on September 8th, 2007 04:01
  • 2

    Entire article.

    Notice the quote saying Kaiser has to make all that profit so it can build new buildings for its rapidly growing member base. Which would make sense, except Kaiser membership has been fairly stagnant for a while now……

  • 3

    Thanks for the link to the full story. I tried, but couldn’t find it anywhere over the weekend.

  • 4

    I am pleased with the services provided by Kaiser Permanente doctors. They’re the best and the premium is still inexpensive. I would recommend this healthcare to anyone. Thanks Kaiser.

  • 5

    Sure, ‘Josh’, whatever you say. Even folks who like Kaiser rarely refer to the Kaiser experience as “the best.” A more typical sentiment starts out something like this: “I know Kaiser has its problems, but…”

    You gave away your financial interest in Kaiser when you accessed via a Yahoo search for kaiser permanente 2nd quarter 2007 financial report. Since you also didn’t spend more than a few seconds looking around at all the death and destruction Kaiser has caused, at best your comment comes across as selfish and uninformed, and at worst as someone (Kaiser employee?) with an ulterior motive.

    Spend an hour reading through all the horror stories, then come back and tell us how great Kaiser is.

  • 6

    I was just about to say “well Josh, it looks like you don’t have very high standards in life if you think Kaiser is the best.” No reasonable expectations of any kind from anyone.

    Thanks Admin for clarifying because I could not imagine where this guy was coming from.

  • 7

    [...] to address their complaints about Kaiser, while giving awards to himself and misrepresenting his non profit in name only organization as the preferred model for the future of American health care. George can be so [...]

  • 8

    [...] We’re practically speechless, so we’ll just ask one question: How can a non-profit double its net income — with zero membership growth — and still call itself a non-profit? [...]

 

RSS feed for comments on this post | TrackBack URI