One of my clients recently recommended that I read Professor Daniel Hatcher‘s The Poverty Industry. So I did. Now I understand why my client was so adamant that I read the book, and with the same urgency, I recommend that you do the same.

Hatcher addresses the “poverty industry,” akin to the military industrial complex of which President Eisenhower warned. But it’s worse than that:

In 2011, the defense industry spent in excess of $134 million on government lobbying efforts. Impressive. But the healthcare industry spent almost four times that amount – more than half a billion dollars, including a significant focus on lobbying related to government healthcare problems for the poor. The defense industry also spent almost $24 million in 2011 on campaign contributions, but the healthcare industry multiplied that amount by almost eleven. In fact, campaign contributions made only on behalf of hospitals and nursing homes were about equal to all the campaign contributions made on behalf of the entire defense industry.

Not many Americans are aware of the extent to which private interests are intimately involved in healthcare aspects of what Hatcher refers to as “fiscal federalism.” Most of us believe that the federal government provides money to states, and permits states to deliver those funds to vulnerable populations in a manner most meaningful to the particular circumstances of those populations. But private contractors are interjected into this relationship, creating the iron triangle and the worrisome statistics noted above.

Contractors like MAXIMUS and PCG (the Public Consulting Group) operate internationally, helping governments’ take advantage of financial opportunities. What opportunities that we talking about? Taking Social Security benefits from children in the foster care system.  Taking Medicaid payments for nursing home care, and applying them to state general fund coffers or other projects that have absolutely no linkage to care of the elderly. (By the way, such contractors are often also hired by the federal government for audit activities, creating a scenario in which they are responsible for checking off on their own behavior.)

One of the examples Hatcher shares in the book hits close to home. The Marion County Health & Hospital Corporation in Indianapolis began buying for-profit nursing homes throughout Indiana. It then contracted with American Senior Communities to manage them. Owning the nursing homes permitted the claiming of more federal dollars, which would presumably be used to increase the quality of care nursing home residents were receiving. (Note that Indiana rates abysmally in regard to the quality of care experienced by nursing home residents.) In fact, the Indiana General Assembly passed a bill that would require any additional federal dollars to be spent on nursing homes. However, Governor Frank O’Bannon vetoed the bill, allowing the federal dollars to be routed elsewhere. Ultimately, they were used to fund Eskenazi Hospital. Quality of care in Indiana’s nursing homes is still deplorable.

The Poverty Industry describes numerous other examples of private companies – often with shareholders to keep in mind – working with the government to take advantage of those to whom the money was intended. It is a great eye-opener, and is likely to disturb you like no other non-fiction book on the market. I strongly recommend that everyone read this and then look into how their own state manages public benefits coming from the federal government.