Cone Health’s “Profit”

An interesting article in the News and Record reports that Cone Health’s excess revenue over expenses surged to $364.7 million this past year. This represented an 84% increase from the previous year.

This measure is analogous to profit but it cannot be described that way because Cone is organized as a not-for-profit.

Now, what does Cone do with its “profit”?

It rewards its executives with pay often in excess of $1 million per year.

It builds its empire by constructing and acquiring new facilities to control ever increasing portions of the health care marketplace.

It appears also, at least on the surface, that the system maintains robust reserves given the degree of investment income it earned last year. And one must acknowledge that the system must earn some degree of “profit” in order to survive.

But what could they do with all this money? Pay its employees more. Allow its employees to work a full shift instead of sending them home at the first opportunity or cancelling them when they perceive they can get by with this. Many employees lose personal earnings because of this profoundly unethical business strategy. And they would be able to pay employees more if they paid the administrative executive/manager class less.

Of course, they could also charge customers less. But all these things are not part of the “for profit” business model.

Disabuse yourself of the notion that this is a humanitarian, altruistic organization.