Hospitals routinely pad their bills. For that matter, so do other health care providers. If you have health insurance and you've been hospitalized or had an outpatient procedure recently, you've probably been astounded at the difference between what the health care provider charged versus what the insurance company or Medicare paid them.

Hospitals and providers claim that bill padding is their defense against the aggressive fee cutting efforts of insurers and government programs. But the end result is that the only patients who are stuck with those outrageously inflated bills are the uninsured (without giant insurance companies to negotiate lower rates for them). Because few actually pay their bills, many escaping through bankruptcy, the hospital further increases its fees.