Taxpayers Spend 22% More Per Patient to Support Medicare Advantage

Medicare Advantage was supposed to find efficiencies, but instead is costing taxpayers an extra $83 billion a year

The Medicare Advantage program enrolls over half of Medicare beneficiaries. However, the $83-billion-per-year overpayment of plans, which amounts to more than 8% of Medicare’s total budget, is unsustainable.
The Medicare Advantage program enrolls over half of Medicare beneficiaries. However, the $83-billion-per-year overpayment of plans, which amounts to more than 8% of Medicare’s total budget, is unsustainable.
Dragos Condrea/Envato
Share
The Medicare Advantage program enrolls over half of Medicare beneficiaries. However, the $83-billion-per-year overpayment of plans, which amounts to more than 8% of Medicare’s total budget, is unsustainable.
The Medicare Advantage program enrolls over half of Medicare beneficiaries. However, the $83-billion-per-year overpayment of plans, which amounts to more than 8% of Medicare’s total budget, is unsustainable.
Dragos Condrea/Envato
Taxpayers Spend 22% More Per Patient to Support Medicare Advantage
Copy

Medicare Advantage – the commercial alternative to traditional Medicare – is drawing down federal health care funds, costing taxpayers an extra 22% per enrollee to the tune of US$83 billion a year.

Medicare Advantage, also known as Part C, was supposed to save the government money. The competition among private insurance companies, and with traditional Medicare, to manage patient care was meant to give insurance companies an incentive to find efficiencies. Instead, the program’s payment rules overpay insurance companies on the taxpayer’s dime.

Read the full article on The Conversation.

Scientists warn that rising ocean temperatures have pushed northern shrimp to the brink, prompting regulators to extend a decade-long moratorium on a fishery that was once a New England winter staple
Developed to catch health issues emerging in the ‘fourth trimester,’ the van provides daily blood-pressure monitoring, counseling, and community-based follow-up for Rhode Island mothers
The Wilbury Theatre Group’s latest production, “Octet,” explores the many ways technology can damage our lives and relationships
With band members straddling the Seekonk River, the Providence-based Moonlight Ramblers released a single about a driver hoping to get home on a broken bridge
From choir takeovers to Krampus markets, here are our picks for what to see and do across Rhode Island this week