A Weekly Read By Doug Aldeen
Activist New York Governor, Kathy Hochul, has vowed to protect New Yorkers from medical debt, limit hospitals’ ability to sue patients and expand financial assistance programs as part of her 2024 State of the State.
Ms. Hochul aims to introduce legislation that would curb hospitals’ ability to sue patients earning less than 400% of the federal poverty level ($120,000 for a family of four).
The legislation would also expand hospital financial assistance programs for low-income New Yorkers, limit the size of monthly payments and interest charged for medical debt, among other protections to improve access to financial assistance and mitigate the effects of medical debt.
Takeaways and market impact should this sweeping legislation become reality :
A) “I cannot afford the pay raise at work because it will move me out of the free health care bucket… .”
B) 85% of the market is at or below 400% of the FPL. I would RBR every facility for the other 15%. The most the facility can recover is the reasonable value of those services;
C) Cash and direct contracts should become the customary way of doing business;
D) Milton Friedman once quipped: “If the government was in charge of the Sahara Desert, it would run out of sand in five years… .”
