I'll break this down simply:

- the Affordable Care Act subsidizes American health insurance with tax payer funds by covering much of the cost of insurance

- Health insurance companies are required by law to spend 85% of that revenue on healthcare

- Health insurance companies, logically, acquire providers. Thus, the 85% of their spending on healthcare is just funneled into the other companies that they own

The system is currently the worst of both worlds. We have tax payer funds going straight to for-profit entities which have become vertically integrated throughout every aspect of the American healthcare system.

Previous discussion (6 points, 6 days ago, 13 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42380377

This article completely seems to miss the point. If your profits are capped by regulation, how can you increase them? Increase costs.

I don't know how you can write so many words about health insurance and not mention this even once, even concluding your post with "Why don't they have the same profit levels as the S&P?"