He then revealed that he bought a $15 million medical debt portfolio for a minimal fraction of the price at $60,000. According to the host, this is the largest one-time giveaway ever on television, beating out Oprah Winfrey’s famous “You get a auto!” As Oliver explained, Americans collectively owe $US12 trillion in debt, and $US436 billion ($591 billion) of that is seriously delinquent – i.e., 90 days or more past due. Oprah had previously laid claim to that record when she gave everyone in her 276-person audience a Pontiac sedan in a giveaway that equated around $8 million.
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In the United States, unpaid medical debts – sometimes decades old – are able to be purchase by third parties for a fraction of the price. He called his company Central Asset Recovery Professional, Inc, or CARP, “for the bottom-feeding fish”.
Oliver revealed Sunday night that a couple of months ago, he and his producers spent $50 to start a debt-buying company.
Oliver’s show, “Last Week Tonight”, engages in a form of investigative comedy, and showed the abuses of some of these companies who try to collect on debts.
So now, thanks to John Oliver, we have a clearer understanding of the flawed debt-buying system, and we’re totally jealous of absolutely thrilled for those people who have been relieved of their medical debts.
What he did in creating a debt-buying company, of course, was just to prove a larger point, just like when he created a tax-exempt church or Stephen Colbert made a superPAC.
With the tap of a giant red button, streams of confetti, dramatic music and strobe lights, Oliver transferred the file with the 9,000 debtors’ personal information to RIP Medical Debt, a nonprofit that forgives medical debt with no tax consequences for the debtor.
He excitedly proclaimed “I am the new queen of daytime talk!” “But the least we can do with this debt, that I can’t f***ing believe we are allowed to own, is give it away”.
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Oliver noted that his action would only directly help the 9,000 people affected by the debt forgiveness.
