In his most recent segment, the late-night host spent about 20 minutes talking about how complicated and twisted the debt buying process is in this country before making television history with an announcement. The show gathered news reports of debtors who were hassled and threatened repeatedly by collectors over debts, sometimes even after a declared bankruptcy or death.
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That’s right, every single penny of the $14,922,261.76 his debt-buying company had purchased!
Using a company that he set up purely for the show, known as Central Assets Recovery Professionals Inc., or CARP (in reference to the bottom-feeding fish of the same name), Oliver was able to buy up $15,000,000 worth of debt. There’s so much debt that the people who are owed much of it can’t be bothered to collect – they figure they can’t get blood from a stone. “You get a vehicle!” episode, which cost that show $8 million.
John Oliver’s show is pretty great at bringing some things that are seriously messed up out into the harsh light of day.
After setting up the company and a very bare-bones website, Oliver says they “were offered a portfolio of almost $15 million of out-of-statute medical debt from Texas”.
Rather than use that information in harmful ways, as some debt collectors do, Oliver chose to forgive it all in one magnificent move.
“I am the new queen of daytime talk”, Oliver joked, referencing Oprah Winfrey’s famous audience auto giveaway on a 2004 episode of “The Oprah Winfrey Show”. “Last Week Tonight” was able to pay less than half a cent on the dollar for all that debt.
On Last Week Tonight on Sunday, John Oliver demonstrated that anyone can be a debt collector – in a stunt that proved just how easy it is to start a debt collection agency and start harassing people for their money. Oliver turned the debt over to a company called RIP Medical Debt, which specializes in forgiving medical debt with no tax consequences for the debtor. “There would be absolutely nothing wrong with that, except for the fact that absolutely everything is wrong with that”.
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Companies buy that kind of debt and it’s big business, he said.
