<OT> Saving Taxpayer's money

From: Michael Mattias (michael.mattias_at_gte.net)
Date: 11/11/04 

Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 19:46:00 GMT

About two months ago I posted a reply to someone in either
comp.lang.basic.misc or comp.lang.cobol (sorry, can't remember which, so I
am following up in both places) in which I pointed out that not all the news
vis-a-vis the cost of taxpayer-funded healthcare was bad: that this year -
for the first time since 1994 - Electronic Data Systems (EDS) would face a
competitive bidding situation for the contract to administer Wisconsin's
Medicaid and other healthcare programs.

Well, the results are in.

Yesterday, November 10 2004, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported in a a
news story that EDS had won that contract. EDS got this five-year contract
for a bid of $183.7 million, some $15 million less than the next best bid..

Had Wisconsin remained "business as usual" and allowed the contract to
automatically renew (as it had done since 1994), the five year cost would
have been $277 million.

Competition saved the taxpayers of Wisconsin over $93 million over five
years.

In today's (11/11/04) Journal Sentinel one of the editorials also dealt with
this topic. Beyond a recitation of the financial facts, the JS editors made
this observation:

"Confusing is why EDS can suddenly do the job of administration and billing
for Medicaid, BadgerCare and SeniorCare for millions less than it had been
doing when it didn't have to bid competitively. An EDS spokesman declined to
comment on that aspect."

Confusing, indeed. (But I think the reason might rhyme with the second
syllable of "indeed"). 

--
Michael Mattias
Tal Systems, Inc.
Racine WI
mmattias@talsystems.com

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