The cold-blooded murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson has produced some ugly reactions.
Liberal politicians and commentators seized upon Thompson's murder as an excuse to complain about insurance companies. But their outrage should be directed at the federal government, says Seamus Bruner on the most recent episode of The Drill Down.
As an example of the ugly reaction, progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) declared, "The visceral response from people across this country who feel cheated, ripped off, and threatened by the vile practices of their insurance companies should be a warning to everyone in the health care system."
Bruner, author of the book Controligarchs and Vice President of Research for the Government Accountability Institute (GAI), tells host Eric Eggers he finds such statements "despicable."
The real reason health insurance and health care are so expensive in the US, Bruner says, is because of the government. When you mandate that people have to buy something, it raises the price of that thing, he tells Eggers.
The killing of Thompson, in cold blood in front of his New York hotel building, shocked Americans. Investigators identified the likely killer days before patrons and workers at a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania, recognized a stranger and called local police.
The suspect, a 26-year-old Ivy League graduate from a wealthy family in Baltimore, drew strange fascination from some online, obsession over the good looks of the man charged with cold-blooded crime. Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel gleefully shared comments on his show from his staff who thought the alleged killer was "hot."
"It's a weird and wild time we are living in," host Eric Eggers agrees.
But even those strange reactions are misdirected.
"Luigi may have become the story," Eggers says, "but the real story is your costs and tax dollars."
Health care costs more - and health insurers try to cover less - because the federal government has distorted the marketplace through Obamacare, Bruner says.
And politicians such as Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) should understand that, because they were part of the Congress that in 2009 passed the Affordable Care Act, known as "Obamacare." The law was supposed to bring down the cost of health insurance by requiring every American to participate in it, but the law has in many ways made the problem worse.
Various efforts to reform Obamacare have not been successful. Eggers notes that Obamacare changed the economics of health insurance, making everything more expensive. "Lots of people make lots of money off of the problems."
Bruner agrees. His research led him to the conclusion that the federal government is essentially in a business partnership with healthcare companies, particularly the pharmaceutical industry. And he notes that more than half of all annual spending on healthcare, $218 billion, comes from the federal government. So not only are Americans paying more in premiums, but they are paying a second time with their tax dollars.
The hosts don't take the insurance industry's side, however. Eggers notes that UnitedHealthcare was hit with a lawsuit last year for using an artificial intelligence model that was shown to have a 90% error rate in its processes to prematurely kick elderly patients out of care facilities.
Among health insurance companies, UHC has the highest claims denial rate in the country -- 33 percent. But health insurance companies have enjoyed sharply better stock prices. Between 2019 and 2023, the S&P stock index rose 250 percent, but the stocks of healthcare companies rose nearly four times that percentage.
Incoming President Donald Trump was asked on Meet the Press this week about what he would do about healthcare costs and why he didn't try to repeal Obamacare in his first term. Trump said, "I had a decision to make. Do I make [Obamacare] as good as I can make it, or do I let it rot."
Time will tell if the new administration will try to reform the economic realities of health insurance in the U.S., but in the meantime, some have turned Thompson's alleged killer, a 26-year-old Ivy League graduate Luigi Mangione, into a sex symbol.
"Luigi may have become the story," Eggers says, "but the real story is your costs and tax dollars."