Chicago’s Nonprofit Hospitals Criticized

The Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, a nonprofit research and advocacy group in Chicago, is releasing a study that says nonprofit hospitals in the Chicago area are getting three times more in tax breaks than they are giving out in free care, the Associated Press reports. The study estimates that 21 Chicago-area hospital networks annually receive $326-million in tax breaks, but give out $105-million in free or discounted charity care to poor people and those without health insurance.

Hospital trade groups complained that the study overestimates the amount of tax breaks the area’s hospital networks receive each year, and does not consider the difference between how much it costs hospitals to treat Medicaid patients and how much the government is willing to pay.