Dan believes healthcare costs in the USA didn’t rise randomly, but because the system is structurally designed to reward higher spending rather than efficiency or outcomes. Over time, policies like cost-sharing, insurance expansion, and managed care have failed to address the root issue, instead redistributing costs within the system while incentives remained unchanged.

He argues that a key driver is pricing power and inflated costs across the system, where higher spending is often normalised rather than challenged. This is reinforced by a broader tendency to stick with the status quo, even among decision-makers responsible for controlling costs.

Dan also aligns with Warren Buffett’s view that the healthcare system acts as a “tapeworm on the U.S. economy”, draining corporate profitability and competitiveness more than taxes ever do. This reflects a structural issue where the system is not incentivised to reduce costs, but to sustain them.

He explains that major reforms have repeatedly failed because they focus on who pays rather than why costs rise. Instead, he advocates addressing the root causes of price inflation, rewarding measurable cost reductions, and improving pricing transparency so employers can make informed decisions.

Dan believes employee benefits weren’t intentionally designed, but instead evolved through tax policy and business decisions, leaving employers locked into a system that continues to become more expensive. He argues this default structure has gone largely unchallenged because businesses often trust brokers and benefits advisors without fully questioning incentives or outcomes.

He emphasises that many employers are not actively involved enough in their healthcare decisions, leading to passive acceptance of rising costs. While businesses ultimately “get what they accept” in terms of costs, he stresses that employees should not bear the consequences of this lack of engagement.

Dan encourages employers to move away from treating traditional group health plans as the only option, and instead adopt more controlled, outcome-driven benefits strategies. This includes exploring flexible models where companies set predictable budgets while giving employees more structured access to care without unexpected cost rises.

Dan believes the biggest misconception in the USA that reducing healthcare costs requires reducing care. He believes meaningful cost reductions are achievable without compromising benefits quality, and supports this with real-world examples where his approach has delivered significant savings (e.g. reducing costs by 50%).

His focus is on helping employers move from reacting to rising costs to actively redesigning how benefits are structured, with the goal of aligning cost efficiency with better health outcomes.

Through Better Benefits USA, he works with organisations to identify avoidable cost drivers, improve plan design, and create systems where better outcomes naturally reduce overall spend.

He also draws on his experience running a mental health-focused nonprofit, where strong retention (~95% vs ~70% industry average) demonstrates how better-designed systems can improve both human and financial outcomes.

Dan believes employers often struggle to fully understand healthcare spending due to the complexity of the system, which makes it difficult to clearly identify inefficiencies and overpayments.

Because of this lack of transparency, many organisations rely heavily on external advisors without being able to properly evaluate whether the guidance they receive is delivering true value.

His focus is on improving transparency in how decisions are made and how value is measured, shifting away from traditional models that prioritize spend volume toward approaches that prioritize measurable savings and outcomes.

He advocates for a more transparent advisory approach where success is defined by cost efficiency and improved outcomes, rather than activity or total spend managed.