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Mark Cuban's Response When Told He Could End World Hunger: 'I'm In! Tell Me How'

MarketDash Editorial Team
5 hours ago
When a Bluesky user claimed billionaire Mark Cuban could solve world hunger without denting his fortune, he didn't dodge the challenge. Instead, Cuban redirected the conversation to healthcare reform, where he believes he can actually make a difference through transparent pricing and his Cost Plus Drugs initiative.

Billionaire Mark Cuban isn't pretending he has a magic wand. When someone on Bluesky suggested he could "literally end world hunger" without even noticing the expense, Cuban didn't get defensive or dismissive. His response was straightforward: "I'm in! Tell me how."

Tackling Problems He Can Actually Solve

When another user pushed back, implying Cuban couldn't be very intelligent if he didn't already know how to deploy his wealth against global hunger, Cuban responded with self-deprecating sarcasm: "I'm dumb. I can't figure out how to end world hunger." But he didn't leave it there. He shifted the conversation to something he believes is both urgent and within his reach: fixing American healthcare.

"I do promise that I will continue to change healthcare in this country and make it more affordable, possibly setting a path towards Universal Healthcare," Cuban wrote.

This isn't just talk. Cuban has been actively working through Cost Plus Drugs, his company designed to strip away the layers of profit-taking that drive up medication costs. The model is simple and radical at the same time: add a 15% markup to drugs, publish every price online, and cut out the middlemen entirely. The company now offers more than 6,000 medications, all with transparent pricing.

Cuban has been particularly vocal about pharmacy benefit managers, the industry players who were originally supposed to reduce costs but instead became behemoths focused on profit. According to Cuban, these entities bought up insurance companies and retail pharmacies, and now they're even trying to move into pharmaceutical manufacturing. "They got greedy," he told Fortune earlier this year.

Why Universal Healthcare Isn't As Easy As Flipping A Switch

Cuban believes "healthcare is a right," but he's realistic about the obstacles to achieving universal healthcare in the United States. In a September post on X, he explained why simply adopting another country's system won't work here. "The easy answer is to say Universal Healthcare. The challenge is that every single country that has UHC, moved to it before medical science introduced advanced expensive equipment."

The real difficulty, according to Cuban, is designing a system that delivers care equitably without bankrupting doctors and hospitals in the process. "The only challenge is how we design the system that works in this country," he wrote.

Cuban has proposed alternatives that work within the existing American framework rather than tearing everything down. His ideas include removing insurance companies from their central role, eliminating traditional premiums, and expanding cash-pay options with published pricing. Under this model, patients would commit to what they can afford, and taxpayers would cover the rest.

"Still have work to do on the numbers, and this is off the top of my head," he admitted in response to a question on X. "But I would allow patients to pick whatever cash pay provider that honors their published price."

Cuban's proposals are works in progress, but they reflect his pragmatic approach to systemic problems. Rather than advocating for a single sweeping transformation, he's exploring how transparency, fair pricing, and incremental change might create a more achievable path forward. It's not as satisfying as declaring you'll end world hunger, but it might actually work.

Back to News

Mark Cuban's Response When Told He Could End World Hunger: 'I'm In! Tell Me How'

MarketDash Editorial Team
5 hours ago
When a Bluesky user claimed billionaire Mark Cuban could solve world hunger without denting his fortune, he didn't dodge the challenge. Instead, Cuban redirected the conversation to healthcare reform, where he believes he can actually make a difference through transparent pricing and his Cost Plus Drugs initiative.

Billionaire Mark Cuban isn't pretending he has a magic wand. When someone on Bluesky suggested he could "literally end world hunger" without even noticing the expense, Cuban didn't get defensive or dismissive. His response was straightforward: "I'm in! Tell me how."

Tackling Problems He Can Actually Solve

When another user pushed back, implying Cuban couldn't be very intelligent if he didn't already know how to deploy his wealth against global hunger, Cuban responded with self-deprecating sarcasm: "I'm dumb. I can't figure out how to end world hunger." But he didn't leave it there. He shifted the conversation to something he believes is both urgent and within his reach: fixing American healthcare.

"I do promise that I will continue to change healthcare in this country and make it more affordable, possibly setting a path towards Universal Healthcare," Cuban wrote.

This isn't just talk. Cuban has been actively working through Cost Plus Drugs, his company designed to strip away the layers of profit-taking that drive up medication costs. The model is simple and radical at the same time: add a 15% markup to drugs, publish every price online, and cut out the middlemen entirely. The company now offers more than 6,000 medications, all with transparent pricing.

Cuban has been particularly vocal about pharmacy benefit managers, the industry players who were originally supposed to reduce costs but instead became behemoths focused on profit. According to Cuban, these entities bought up insurance companies and retail pharmacies, and now they're even trying to move into pharmaceutical manufacturing. "They got greedy," he told Fortune earlier this year.

Why Universal Healthcare Isn't As Easy As Flipping A Switch

Cuban believes "healthcare is a right," but he's realistic about the obstacles to achieving universal healthcare in the United States. In a September post on X, he explained why simply adopting another country's system won't work here. "The easy answer is to say Universal Healthcare. The challenge is that every single country that has UHC, moved to it before medical science introduced advanced expensive equipment."

The real difficulty, according to Cuban, is designing a system that delivers care equitably without bankrupting doctors and hospitals in the process. "The only challenge is how we design the system that works in this country," he wrote.

Cuban has proposed alternatives that work within the existing American framework rather than tearing everything down. His ideas include removing insurance companies from their central role, eliminating traditional premiums, and expanding cash-pay options with published pricing. Under this model, patients would commit to what they can afford, and taxpayers would cover the rest.

"Still have work to do on the numbers, and this is off the top of my head," he admitted in response to a question on X. "But I would allow patients to pick whatever cash pay provider that honors their published price."

Cuban's proposals are works in progress, but they reflect his pragmatic approach to systemic problems. Rather than advocating for a single sweeping transformation, he's exploring how transparency, fair pricing, and incremental change might create a more achievable path forward. It's not as satisfying as declaring you'll end world hunger, but it might actually work.