Disaster Profiteers See Dollar Signs In Haiti
In The Nation, Jeremy Scahill writes on how Blackwater-esque private security companies are chomping at the bit for huge paydays offering their ’services’ in the reshaping of Haiti:
We saw this type of Iraq-style disaster profiteering in New Orleans, and you can expect to see a lot more of this in Haiti over the coming days, weeks and months. Private security companies are seeing big dollar signs in Haiti thanks in no small part to the media hype about “looters.”
Among the services offered are: “High Threat terminations,” dealing with “worker unrest,” armed guards and “Armed Cargo Escorts.”
The Sick Business of Health-Care Profiteering
Think Wall Street’s titans are the highest paid C.E.O.’s in the land? Think again. With median annual compensation of more than $12 million, medical moguls take the pay prize, even as the quality of care we receive falls to embarrassing lows. As the debate over health-care reform intensifies, Vanity Fair’s Matt Kapp catalogues the industry’s unbridled profiteering:
It’s become a national pastime to bash Wall Street’s lavish pay packages, but as we enter the vortex of another health-care showdown, consider these overlooked facts: With median annual compensation of more than $12.4 million, C.E.O.’s at the big health-care companies make two-thirds more than their counterparts in finance and are the highest paid of any industry. The health-care industry’s total annual profit has grown to an estimated $200 billion, and it doled out nearly…
