Non-profit hospital tax breaks attacked by Grassley, again

I hope they finally get this right! Too many non-profit facilities have profit margins much, much too high to be subsidized by tax payers. Provide a minimum level of charity care or be shut!

While I applaude the Senator for taking up the banner for charity care, he appears to be making the assumption that all hospitals are the same.

I work for a hospital system that billed for $3 billion in services last year. How much of that do you think was collected? How about $800 million. The rest was written of as bad debt and some was written off as charity care. Of that $800 million, $60 million was given back to the community in various forms of charity whether it be through free clinics we provide, homeless shelters we support, or other charities. Also of note is the fact that our children's hospital loses money EVERY year due to the fact that we do not turn any child away regardless of their parent's ability to pay.

The problem is that people seem to think that medical care should be provided free of charge to everyone who asks for it. No one stops to think about what happens if medical care is made free of charge or if hospital lose their non-profit status. People will lose their jobs leave hospitals unable to meet the healthcare needs of the community. We currently have 15 hospitals in our system and if we lost our tax breaks the result would be devastating. It would result in nearly $120 in additional property taxes and who knows how much in income taxes. Out of $800 million that won't leave much.

My point is that people seem to think that hospital are these large, wealth corporations that are just rolling in money but that's far from the truth. Some systems like ours are barely able to meet expenditures year to year thanks.

If the Senator really wants to go after companies for their lack of charity, try the oil industry. They seem to have a lot of money right now.