Haven never stood a chance. The nonprofit created by Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, and JPMorgan Chase to tame costs and improve quality in job-based health insurance is floundering after more than two years of operations. Its problems stem from a flawed premise. The founding companies assumed that employer-sponsored coverage could be fixed with entrepreneurial energy and creative use of information technology. They were wrong. The cause of today’s dysfunction is misaligned incentives embedded in federal policy. The solution is a new law.
That realization may be why Atul Gawande — the Harvard professor, surgeon, and prolific author turned Haven CEO — announced recently that he was resigning his post with the venture to focus on the COVID-19 crisis (he will remain chairman of Haven’s board). His departure before launching any meaningful or scalable initiatives leaves the nonprofit’s future in doubt.
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