https://healthcareuncovered.substack.com/p/as-americans-struggled-health-insurers?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=255152&post_id=170288533&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=59t65&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

Ahead of my Congressional testimony last week before the Senate HELP committee, I compiled data on the profits, revenues and CEO compensations of big health insurers in 2024. The curiosity from senators on both sides of the aisle signaled, to me, that lawmakers are as interested as I’ve ever seen in the industry’s rampant profiteering.

What I found was that the seven biggest publicly traded health insurance companies collectively made $71.3 billion in profits, up more than half a billion dollars from 2023. All while millions of Americans continued to skip their medications, rationed insulin and delayed care due to insurers’ out-of-pocket demands.

Let’s break it down.

You won’t be surprised to learn that shareholders are not the only ones benefiting from the care-restricting barriers insurers have erected to boost profits. The CEOs of those seven companies took home a combined $146.1 million in 2024 compensation. That’s enough to cover annual premiums for thousands of American families.

Here’s what the top brass made:

Meanwhile, patients across the country report increasing out-of-pocket costs, more aggressive prior authorizations and narrower provider networks. But for these executives, the real measure of success is how high they can push their stock prices and not how many people can afford to see a doctor.

So, What’s Driving the Revenue Surge?

One word: Gouging.

Insurers continued to jack up premiums for their commercial customers and overcharge the government. Despite watchdog warnings, Uncle Sam continues to pour money into private Medicare Advantage plans even as audits and investigations uncover widespread fraud and upcoding. And Medicaid managed care is a gold mine, too. These insurers now dominate state Medicaid contracts and can quietly extract billions through behind-the-scenes ownership of pharmacies, PBMs and providers.

It’s not just health insurance anymore — it’s a monopolized empire.

All that said, to the dismay of shareholders, the big seven insurers have had to admit that so far in 2025, they’ve paid more medical claims than they had expected, which means their profits were down somewhat during the first months of the year. I’ll shed more light on that in a future post. No need for you to shed any tears for them, though, because we’re still talking billions and billions in profits.

So if you’re wondering why your premiums, deductibles and costs at the pharmacy counter keep going up — just look at those 2024 numbers. We all paid more for health insurance and got less for the hard-earned money we had to shovel out for our “coverage.” 

And expect even more financial pain (and difficulty getting the care you need) as these companies do all they can to get their profit margins back to where Wall Street wants them.