The history of the English landscape garden is one of luxury. Rain is abundant but there’s the opportunity cost of the land, walls of needy hedges, lawns to cut, and sweat. All throughout England, hedges or hedgerows, mark the landscapes. They were also developed as mounds of dirt topped with bushes to act as a…
Category: Industry Trends
JP Morgan’s $100 Million
At the center of this 1918 picture is John Pierpont Morgan, JP Morgan, the founder of the eponymous firm (now JPMorgan Chase & Co.) who helped bail out the US government during the panic of 1893. I wish I could say the photobombing kid was my grandpa. That would be a great family story. Today…
On Tailwinds
Anyone who wants to understand business should read Warren Buffett’s letters*. All of them. Even his partnership ones when he was in his 30s. I read them about 10 years ago, and continue to intellectually salivate near the end of February when a new one is published. They’re especially an interesting respite and cross-disciplinary perspective…
Healthcare Costs In Retirement
Nothing shows aspirational retirement imagery like convertibles, park benches, golf, and beaches. To add a dose of reality, $280,000 is a number that’s referenced in many studies. It comes from a rigorous report from Fidelity as the amount an average couple retiring today at 65 would need in today’s after-tax dollars to cover future health…
February’s Index
A monthly list of interesting facts and figures from the world of healthcare, finance, and public markets. 2/3: The estimated number of Medicare quality metrics deemed uncertain or invalid by a NEJM study. 25%: the percentage of healthcare costs attributable to the top 1%. 1%: the likelihood of being in the top 10% of healthcare…
Putting a Price on Benefits
With the US close to full employment, for employees, health benefits could matter more. Many prospective hires are rightly fixated on salary, bonus, growth, and purpose but draw blanks on benefits. “The company offers a few plans and I pay around $1,000 year in premiums” is the usual type of analysis, if at all. Some…
Arbitrage and Healthcare
There are different types of arbitrage. Dictionary.com defines one form as the “the simultaneous purchase and sale of the same securities, commodities or foreign exchange in different markets to profit from unequal prices.” Imagine buying gold in Italy in euros and selling it at the same time in New York in dollars. Those differences are short-lived and have transaction costs. Millions of people doing this across different…
January’s Healthcare Index
Inspired by the monthly Harper’s Index, this is 2019’s first index on healthcare and finance. The average ratio of Medicaid-to-Medicare payments spending across the US across all services: .72; In CA: .52. The factor by which commercial insurance payments exceed the reimbursements from Medicare: 1.88x The net assets of HCA, the largest publicly-traded hospital in the…
What Bartleby Says
It’s a fine day for the people who care about this sort of stuff when the topic of corporate wellness makes the year’s first edition of The Economist. New resolutions for a new year surely had something to do with the timing. The Bartleby column is out with The spy who hired me. More heat…
Stats on High Deductibles
November has past and healthcare open enrollment is behind us. It’s the time when spreadsheets are pulled together, employees and spouses (even actuaries) run front and back of the envelope calculations to decide where to enroll. Stock photos of happy couples in the 30-page guides beckon workers toward a tortuous process. It’s usually a choice…