Originally posted on Esrati.com Dec 23, 2008 http://esrati.com/why-health-insurance-should-be-outlawed/1536/
Steal billions from shareholders, lie to regulators, overcharge customers and force doctors to work for pennies on the dollar. Yet, there is one person who benefits from this scheme that is helping bring our powerful employers to their knees- yep, the CEO of the insurance company.
Taking home $100 million dollar plus a year salaries, these modern-day pirates steal, cheat and lie their way to riches, while the rest of us are held powerless and at their mercy.
And even when getting caught red-handed, a few fines, no jail time and no shake up of a system that is killing our country and its economy faster than $4-a-gallon gas. Read the entire article to be totally outraged- but here is an excerpt:
In its suit, the SEC accused UnitedHealth of providing senior executives and other employees with in-the-money options while secretly backdating the grants to avoid reporting the expenses to investors.
“UnitedHealth engaged in a long-running scheme to hide over a billion dollars in executive compensation,” Linda Chatman Thomsen, director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement, said in a statement. “By materially misstating these expenses for over a decade, UnitedHealth breached its duty to shareholders to accurately report its financial results.”
UnitedHealth (NYSE:UNH) said in a statement it has “substantially improved its governance, administrative processes and internal controls.”
A federal judge in Minneapolis last week gave preliminary approval for UnitedHealth to pay $895 million to settle a class-action shareholder lawsuit related to the scandal. Former CEO William McGuire is paying $30 million and Lubben is paying $500,000 to settle with shareholders.
The SEC last December reached a settlement with McGuire in which he agreed to pay a $7 million fine and repay about $448 million to UnitedHealth.
via UnitedHealth settles with SEC in stock scandal – Dayton Business Journal:.
Health insurance isn’t the same as health care- and the difference in price that you have to pay if you are uninsured vs insured is one of the greatest crimes against mankind. If this slap on the wrist approach by the SEC doesn’t outrage you- you must be dead already. It’s time to demand accountability from Congress- or to vote them out.
It’s time to pay for health care- not CEO salaries or bailing out stock swindelers. One price, one plan, one payer for all.
It’s also time to lock these criminals up and throw away the key. Health care should be a basic right.
You can see all the posts I’ve written where I said “Health insurance isn’t health care” here: http://esrati.com/page/1/?s=health+insurance+isn%27t+health+care