News Tip: New Health Care Company Removes Profit Motive, Expert Says

Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase announced Tuesday they are forming a company to provide health insurance for their employees in effort to be “free from profit-making incentives.”

Quotes:

“This is really the old story of self-insured employers cutting out the middleman, but infused with the interesting twist of three well-known firms in different sectors joining together,” says Donald H. Taylor, a health care economist at Duke University. “Further, three decidedly for-profit firms are saying that profit motive doesn’t belong in health care.”

“Time will tell if this is truly disruptive. However, it is an example of employers doubling down on making health care work better for their employees instead of seeking to end their involvement in their employees’ health care.”

Bio:
Donald H. Taylor Jr. is a health care economist and professor at Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy, and an affiliate of the Duke-Margolis Center for Health Policy. Taylor researches health care costs and is a member of the National Academies Committee on Health Care Utilization and Adults with Disabilities.
Podcast interview: Ways & Means podcast “A Beautiful Death” https://sanford.duke.edu/people/faculty/taylor-jr-donald-h

For additional comment, contact Taylor at:
don.taylor@duke.edu 
 
---
Media Contact:
Jackie Ogburn
(919) 613-7315, jackie.ogburn@duke.edu 

                              _        _        _        _

Duke experts on a variety of other topics can be found at http://whatsnext.duke.edu/experts/.