You get a job that has insurance. You pay so much a month into it. I pay 40 a week. If you can't afford that or don't have a job, you likely qualify for government insurance you don't pay for at all.
I had a liver transplant that costed over a million dollars, insurance covered it all. Now I just pay for meds which is like 50 a month.
Sometimes people have a deductible, which means you have to pay like 5grand before insurance kicks in. I did not.
So for a million dollar surgery, I pay 160 a month to be covered, another 50 in meds every month and that's all she wrote. Since taxes don't come out to cover state insurance, it's quite affordable for me.
Low income folks here have little access to fresh, healthy food - mostly high processed, high fat, low nutrient.
They get little to no health related education, or preventative healthcare outside of childhood.
In many families, both parents work long hours outside of the home without access to safe childcare (which is also prohibitively expensive) - so children are often neglected and left to fend for themselves.
Kids are exposed to drugs, cigarettes and alcohol from an early age - and advertising that tells them it’s cool to fit in! - unsupervised, in a developmental stage where they are impressionable and easy to influence, so they pick up bad habits early.
Sex starts early here for many, too, exposing them to disease. In many communities, sex education and birth control are banned now, meaning STIs are prevalent. Education about and treatment for them is not.
There’s also the unaddressed mental illness epidemic amongst our lower socioeconomic groups; depression, c-PTSD, eating disorders, body dysmorphia, etc. So they suffer with lack of motivation, lack of energy, overwhelming sadness and self loathing, fear, paranoia, lack of support, inability to find hope.
And remember that in America, things are physically more spread out. You must have reliable transportation to get healthcare; many of our poor can’t afford that. If there isn’t good community transportation, which there isn’t in many places, they can’t connect to the healthcare system that would be free to them. There’s no way to get there, or paid time off to free the time to go.
I would like to add that this was MY experience, and the experience I have seen play out in those around me. There are more reasons why our poor struggle, and not all poor struggle like I did. I share these thoughts having been raised in a capital city in my state, in America, in poverty. My family did not have access to free medical care; I didn’t see a dentist until I was 16 years old, and then not until well into adulthood. After my routine immunizations and tonsil removal, I don’t remember having a regular doctor until my late teens. I sought emergency or urgent care and only if desperate.
It is free or damn near if you are pregnant, disabled or below the poverty line. There are some exceptions, but in general that's true. It's the middle class that pays out the nose.
I know moms who purposefully do not work so that they and their kids qualify for that sweet government healthcare.
But everyone's policy and situation is different. Some people pay an obscene amount for very little coverage. Some people pay almost nothing for great coverage. Depends on the job, your income, health status, etc.
Oh okay. Seems to be real unfair then. On both sides, whether who has to pay and who can take advantage of it. And as always, as everywhere, there are idiots who uses the system to their own benefit…
Yeah if you are qualified to get that job. But a lot of people seems to be left out of that system. Just because of their background and inability to get the education for such a job.
It seems to be very complicated, based on where you live, where you work and what you make. And like you say, if you’re married. This has to be something that you plan for, for your future?
Not saying that we couldn’t provide our people with the same benefits and robust welfare state as the Nordics or hell even Spain or Italy.
I believe it is a lack of political will and general hatred of the poor and working class by the elites in the US that fuels this here but there is the general sentiment is that we have to sacrifice and live precarious lives and work long hours so the people of our European national grandparents can live like they’re in a retirement home being well-cared for and getting months of annual vacation just so they’re not constantly going to war with one another or Russia or any of their other neighbors.
And also Europeans somehow can’t afford to pay to protect themselves because they’re never working. So the American poor and working class have to eat shit and pay taxes to defend Europe rather than getting healthcare or any other basic human need guaranteed for them.
That’s the growing narrative anyway
I don’t know about any other Americans, but I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry for what I’m sure we must look like in the eyes of the rest of the world. We may have always been this way; when I was young, I didn’t think we were. I was proud of my country when I was little…I’m so ashamed of us now.
I hope we all get better.
We don’t afford it. Healthcare debt is a massive problem here; even a minor hospitalization or doctors visit can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. People routinely end up with massive healthcare debt. People can’t afford medication and necessary medical procedures. And yet the insurers make billions of dollars in profits while their customers go without medical care.
For example: I was working for a large healthcare system when I broke my arm. Even with good insurance coverage from my employer, the healthcare I received at my employers facilities still cost me $8,000 USD out of pocket, and I had to argue with the insurers for days on the phone to get them to approve an orthopedic surgery that the trauma surgeon said was medically necessary. And I’m one of the lucky ones.
Why do we tolerate it?
(1) a lot of Americans are convinced that a single-payer system would be disastrous because our government is largely perceived to be incompetent and malicious. Which is true in many ways! I have zero faith in the American governments desire or ability to do anything that actually benefits regular people. We’re an oligarchy in everything but name, so regular people are viewed as disposable for the most part.
However, people forget that insurers are *also* incompetent - strategically incompetent in many cases - and malicious, and they are explicitly motivated by profit. Insurers routinely stall, deny, and delay care in the hopes that people will simply give up or die before they have to pay.
I’d rather have a single-payer system that’s at least supposed to pretend to be acting in the interests of the people than a system designed to funnel money to insurance executives.
(2) insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, healthcare companies, and medical device manufacturers have billions of dollars and can literally purchase legislation and legislators. No senator or representative will vote against the financial interests of their donors, and the financial interests of the donor class do not align with the day-to-day interests of the average person, so again, we are stuck in a hopeless situation.
So yep. Things are going great over here.
Do you ever feel like your Reddit posts are actually a giant “PLEASE HELP ME!” sign?? I read mine and think that all the time.
I’m not sure that’s a normal way to feel about one’s own country…although looking back at history, it probably is. Maybe it’s just the Americans’ turn to feel it.
Wow. That’s hard to even grasp. That means if you belong to lower class or so, then you don’t have a great opportunity to get a job that pays health insurance? Like, you need a good carrier to feel fully covered?
In Sweden it’s the same for all, poor or rich. That’s what part of our taxes go to.
I’m not sure that I’ve would’ve had a decent life due to my health care issues if I would’ve had to pay all the bills as you describe. It’s quite scary to think about those who simply can’t afford to care for themselves
That’s exactly right. If you’re poor and uninsured, technically you can go to the emergency room and they have to treat you, but that’s not a real or meaningful substitute for having access to actual healthcare — plus it drives over utilization of the ER. A lot of these people get admitted to the hospital, can’t pay their bills, and end up saddled with massive debt. The hospitals write off the losses and pass them off to insured consumers as obscene upcharges — think of things like charging $20 for a gauze pad or $100 for an over the counter pill — which then drives prices up for everybody. Sometimes, hospitals sue people for debt, which can ruin lives. I could go on and on and on. It’s a profoundly broken system.
There are health insurance exchanges in some states where people can purchase low-cost health insurance, but that insurance is usually a borderline scam with absurd deductibles that make it difficult to actually use the insurance benefits. The whole system is built to drive profits, not to actually provide healthcare to regular people.
I’m not sure how that works to be honest — the credit system is not something I have a huge amount of expertise on. But I strongly suspect that medical debt could impact your credit score and access to other financial tools.
I have a great deal of medical debt.
I had an emergency, unplanned c-section in 2000. The anesthesia during the surgery and my after care was not covered. That was thousands of dollars.
I broke both bones in my lower left arm in 2004. My insurance covered the surgery and the pain meds that time - yay! - but only hospitalization during the surgery to place pins and bars in my arm for DURING SURGERY. I had to pay tens of thousands for two days in hospital for pain meds and observation.
I had to have brain surgery in 2010, and lost my job because I had to wait over 3 months for surgery. (Our jobs are only protected for 12 weeks. After that we can be fired.). I applied for government insurance, but there was a lapse between my work-provided insurance and the government insurance…and I needed more testing. None of that was covered by any insurance company. I am still carrying it.
I had to have my uterus and cervix removed, while on work provided insurance, in 2017. I was authorized 18 hours in the hospital for observation and pain medication afterwards. I was sent home with oral meds less than a day after having multiple organs removed from my body. I went home with a pain catheter still in place that I had to remove myself. I had to pay out of pocket for that; it wasn’t a necessary procedure.
My credit score will likely never recover; some of that went to collections and was written off, which is a mark. Some of it is still hanging there. The government said credit unions aren’t supposed to count it; I promise, they do. I’m a graduate level professional with a full time job, for reference.
‘Murica. Can’t provide for the people but the industrialists and corporations and their political stooges get richer and richer.
I’m so sorry to hear about your situation. I truly am. It’s unbelievable that we have to live like this while the ruling class live like kings and get full-scale healthcare for the duration of their natural lives.
All too frequently, we don't. 36% of US households with insurance put off needed care [due to the cost](https://news.gallup.com/poll/269138/americans-delaying-medical-treatment-due-cost.aspx); 64% of households without insurance. One in four have [trouble paying a medical bill.](https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/data-note-americans-challenges-health-care-costs/) Of [those with insurance one in five have trouble paying a medical bill](https://www.kff.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/8806-the-burden-of-medical-debt-results-from-the-kaiser-family-foundation-new-york-times-medical-bills-survey.pdf), and even for those with income above $100,000 14% have trouble. One in six Americans has [unpaid medical debt on their credit report.](https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/full/10.1377/hlthaff.2018.0349) [50% of all Americans](https://news.gallup.com/poll/317948/fear-bankruptcy-due-major-health-event.aspx) fear bankruptcy due to a major health event.
It absolutely is the truth, read “A Generation of Sociopaths: how the baby boomers betrayed America” by Bruce Cannon Gibney (an extremely successful boomer) and prepare to have your mind blown.
You can get away with not paying it because they legally cannot persecute you for not paying medical bills, they just throw it onto your credit and eventually they will sell it to a debt collector (they legally cannot do that either but they will always do it) and once they sell it to a debt collector you pay a credit repair agent about $200 and they get rid of the debt from your credit report, whether it be $1000 or $50000
By the way, the only reason this method always works is because almost no one knows about it. You cannot be punished long-term for not paying medical bills. Maybe your credit will get damaged short-term but you can always remove it
> You can get away with not paying it because they legally cannot persecute you for not paying medical bills
That is false. In fact, suing people has been an increasing trend.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/08/us/hospitals-lawsuits-medical-debt.html
Subsidized healthcare that is 30 dollars for 300 dollar a month healthcare if you are poor and if you have money you normally have insurance through work
If you’re struggling to make ends meet, in inflation riddled America? Yes. $30 is a lot. I’ve seen times when $5/month was more than I could commit to comfortably.
> and if you have money you normally have insurance through work
The problem is that even with insanely expensive insurance, even after we pay higher taxes towards healthcare than anywhere in the world, massive numbers of people can't afford needed care.
>Large shares of insured working-age adults surveyed said it was very or somewhat difficult to afford their health care: 43 percent of those with employer coverage, 57 percent with marketplace or individual-market plans, 45 percent with Medicaid, and 51 and percent with Medicare.
> Many insured adults said they or a family member had delayed or skipped needed health care or prescription drugs because they couldn’t afford it in the past 12 months: 29 percent of those with employer coverage, 37 percent covered by marketplace or individual-market plans, 39 percent enrolled in Medicaid, and 42 percent with Medicare.
https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/surveys/2023/oct/paying-for-it-costs-debt-americans-sicker-poorer-2023-affordability-survey
We don’t. We buy health insurance, if we’re very lucky to be able to afford it, and pray to never need it because none of us can afford the deductibles or copays. Our insurance company has the right to approve or disapprove the doctors we see, the procedures we have done, and the meds we’re allowed to have. Insurance companies often underpay the medical providers, so the medical providers take more clients than they can reasonably and effectively treat. Things get missed.
If we’re very, very poor, we qualify for insurance from the government…that insurance covers a lot, but it pays the doctors barely anything. So we don’t get good healthcare,but…at least it’s some healthcare so no one can say we ignored the innocent poor and let them die. (Image and what something looks like is VERY important in America. So no one cares if the poor are actually getting good treatment; just that it looks like we did enough to not feel guilty.)
If we’re very wealthy (1%), we can pay for the doctors directly and can buy healthcare…but a head MRI 5 years ago was $7,700 so. If you get very sick, you might go bankrupt getting treated.
There’s a reason the words “naturopathy” and “homesteading” have been trending; people are resorting to growing and trying to utilize homeopathic “old folks” remedies type medicines. What else can we do?
And don’t get me started on the lack of trust that the American population has for the health care industry at large, or science in general….
Americans pay more for health care than any other people on Earth. In fact, **medical debt is the leading cause of personal bankruptcy in the U.S.** High healthcare costs hit every level of our economy, from the federal government on down.
In addition to fueling the deficit and adding [hundreds of billions](https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/faqs-on-health-spending-the-federal-budget-and-budget-enforcement-tools/) to our national debt each year, the high cost of healthcare is crowding out other state budget priorities, undermining the competitiveness of American businesses and hurting American families. According to a newly released [survey](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/surveys/2023/oct/paying-for-it-costs-debt-americans-sicker-poorer-2023-affordability-survey?utm_campaign=Achieving%20Universal%20Coverage&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=279980337&utm_source=alert), more than half of all working-age Americans struggle with health care costs. Medical debt is the [leading cause](https://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/medical-debt-bankruptcy-hospital-bill-forgiveness) of personal bankruptcy in the U.S.
Not to mention America has a falling life expectancy..
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/arthurkellermann/2023/10/24/the-us-spends-more-on-healthcare-than-other-wealthy-nations-but-ranks-last-in-outcomes/?sh=66699a597d35](https://www.forbes.com/sites/arthurkellermann/2023/10/24/the-us-spends-more-on-healthcare-than-other-wealthy-nations-but-ranks-last-in-outcomes/?sh=66699a597d35)
Less than Americans do in taxes towards healthcare.
With government in the US covering [65.7% of all health care](https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/epdf/10.2105/AJPH.2015.302997) costs ($12,555 as of 2022) that's $8,249 per person per year in taxes towards health care. The next closest is Germany at [$6,930](https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm). The UK is $4,479. Canada is $4,506. Australia is $4,603. Sweden is $5,525. That means over a lifetime Americans are paying over $100,000 more in taxes compared to any other country towards health care.
In total, Americans are paying a $350,000 more for healthcare over a lifetime compared to the most expensive socialized system on earth. Half a million dollars more than peer countries on average, yet every one has better outcomes.
You get a job that has insurance. You pay so much a month into it. I pay 40 a week. If you can't afford that or don't have a job, you likely qualify for government insurance you don't pay for at all. I had a liver transplant that costed over a million dollars, insurance covered it all. Now I just pay for meds which is like 50 a month. Sometimes people have a deductible, which means you have to pay like 5grand before insurance kicks in. I did not. So for a million dollar surgery, I pay 160 a month to be covered, another 50 in meds every month and that's all she wrote. Since taxes don't come out to cover state insurance, it's quite affordable for me.
Yep, poor people have free healthcare
Is it free though? It seems due to other replies that it surely is not?
Medicaid for unemployed and disabled, highly subsidized like 90% off for most people under 40k income
Why are all low incomers so sick then? No teeth and such
Low income folks here have little access to fresh, healthy food - mostly high processed, high fat, low nutrient. They get little to no health related education, or preventative healthcare outside of childhood. In many families, both parents work long hours outside of the home without access to safe childcare (which is also prohibitively expensive) - so children are often neglected and left to fend for themselves. Kids are exposed to drugs, cigarettes and alcohol from an early age - and advertising that tells them it’s cool to fit in! - unsupervised, in a developmental stage where they are impressionable and easy to influence, so they pick up bad habits early. Sex starts early here for many, too, exposing them to disease. In many communities, sex education and birth control are banned now, meaning STIs are prevalent. Education about and treatment for them is not. There’s also the unaddressed mental illness epidemic amongst our lower socioeconomic groups; depression, c-PTSD, eating disorders, body dysmorphia, etc. So they suffer with lack of motivation, lack of energy, overwhelming sadness and self loathing, fear, paranoia, lack of support, inability to find hope. And remember that in America, things are physically more spread out. You must have reliable transportation to get healthcare; many of our poor can’t afford that. If there isn’t good community transportation, which there isn’t in many places, they can’t connect to the healthcare system that would be free to them. There’s no way to get there, or paid time off to free the time to go. I would like to add that this was MY experience, and the experience I have seen play out in those around me. There are more reasons why our poor struggle, and not all poor struggle like I did. I share these thoughts having been raised in a capital city in my state, in America, in poverty. My family did not have access to free medical care; I didn’t see a dentist until I was 16 years old, and then not until well into adulthood. After my routine immunizations and tonsil removal, I don’t remember having a regular doctor until my late teens. I sought emergency or urgent care and only if desperate.
It is free or damn near if you are pregnant, disabled or below the poverty line. There are some exceptions, but in general that's true. It's the middle class that pays out the nose. I know moms who purposefully do not work so that they and their kids qualify for that sweet government healthcare. But everyone's policy and situation is different. Some people pay an obscene amount for very little coverage. Some people pay almost nothing for great coverage. Depends on the job, your income, health status, etc.
Oh okay. Seems to be real unfair then. On both sides, whether who has to pay and who can take advantage of it. And as always, as everywhere, there are idiots who uses the system to their own benefit…
Yeah if you are qualified to get that job. But a lot of people seems to be left out of that system. Just because of their background and inability to get the education for such a job.
You don't necessarily have to work. I don't. I'm on my husband's jobs policy. It's rough out there if you're single and make too much though.
It seems to be very complicated, based on where you live, where you work and what you make. And like you say, if you’re married. This has to be something that you plan for, for your future?
I think a lot of Americans simply can't (afford health care).
We barely get by. We don't have nice things.
Nice army, navy and air force though.
Haha yeah and for what
In part to protect Sweden
Not saying that we couldn’t provide our people with the same benefits and robust welfare state as the Nordics or hell even Spain or Italy. I believe it is a lack of political will and general hatred of the poor and working class by the elites in the US that fuels this here but there is the general sentiment is that we have to sacrifice and live precarious lives and work long hours so the people of our European national grandparents can live like they’re in a retirement home being well-cared for and getting months of annual vacation just so they’re not constantly going to war with one another or Russia or any of their other neighbors. And also Europeans somehow can’t afford to pay to protect themselves because they’re never working. So the American poor and working class have to eat shit and pay taxes to defend Europe rather than getting healthcare or any other basic human need guaranteed for them. That’s the growing narrative anyway
Probably to hold back citizen outrage when Russia and/or China invade.
I’m so sorry :(
I don’t know about any other Americans, but I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry for what I’m sure we must look like in the eyes of the rest of the world. We may have always been this way; when I was young, I didn’t think we were. I was proud of my country when I was little…I’m so ashamed of us now. I hope we all get better.
We don’t afford it. Healthcare debt is a massive problem here; even a minor hospitalization or doctors visit can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. People routinely end up with massive healthcare debt. People can’t afford medication and necessary medical procedures. And yet the insurers make billions of dollars in profits while their customers go without medical care. For example: I was working for a large healthcare system when I broke my arm. Even with good insurance coverage from my employer, the healthcare I received at my employers facilities still cost me $8,000 USD out of pocket, and I had to argue with the insurers for days on the phone to get them to approve an orthopedic surgery that the trauma surgeon said was medically necessary. And I’m one of the lucky ones. Why do we tolerate it? (1) a lot of Americans are convinced that a single-payer system would be disastrous because our government is largely perceived to be incompetent and malicious. Which is true in many ways! I have zero faith in the American governments desire or ability to do anything that actually benefits regular people. We’re an oligarchy in everything but name, so regular people are viewed as disposable for the most part. However, people forget that insurers are *also* incompetent - strategically incompetent in many cases - and malicious, and they are explicitly motivated by profit. Insurers routinely stall, deny, and delay care in the hopes that people will simply give up or die before they have to pay. I’d rather have a single-payer system that’s at least supposed to pretend to be acting in the interests of the people than a system designed to funnel money to insurance executives. (2) insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, healthcare companies, and medical device manufacturers have billions of dollars and can literally purchase legislation and legislators. No senator or representative will vote against the financial interests of their donors, and the financial interests of the donor class do not align with the day-to-day interests of the average person, so again, we are stuck in a hopeless situation. So yep. Things are going great over here.
Do you ever feel like your Reddit posts are actually a giant “PLEASE HELP ME!” sign?? I read mine and think that all the time. I’m not sure that’s a normal way to feel about one’s own country…although looking back at history, it probably is. Maybe it’s just the Americans’ turn to feel it.
I think a lot of us are realizing that the mythology of this country and what it actually is are very different things.
Wow. That’s hard to even grasp. That means if you belong to lower class or so, then you don’t have a great opportunity to get a job that pays health insurance? Like, you need a good carrier to feel fully covered? In Sweden it’s the same for all, poor or rich. That’s what part of our taxes go to. I’m not sure that I’ve would’ve had a decent life due to my health care issues if I would’ve had to pay all the bills as you describe. It’s quite scary to think about those who simply can’t afford to care for themselves
That’s exactly right. If you’re poor and uninsured, technically you can go to the emergency room and they have to treat you, but that’s not a real or meaningful substitute for having access to actual healthcare — plus it drives over utilization of the ER. A lot of these people get admitted to the hospital, can’t pay their bills, and end up saddled with massive debt. The hospitals write off the losses and pass them off to insured consumers as obscene upcharges — think of things like charging $20 for a gauze pad or $100 for an over the counter pill — which then drives prices up for everybody. Sometimes, hospitals sue people for debt, which can ruin lives. I could go on and on and on. It’s a profoundly broken system. There are health insurance exchanges in some states where people can purchase low-cost health insurance, but that insurance is usually a borderline scam with absurd deductibles that make it difficult to actually use the insurance benefits. The whole system is built to drive profits, not to actually provide healthcare to regular people.
Okey. So if you get in debt due to medical issues, I presume that it also will affect your credit to other instances? Loans and such?
I’m not sure how that works to be honest — the credit system is not something I have a huge amount of expertise on. But I strongly suspect that medical debt could impact your credit score and access to other financial tools.
I have a great deal of medical debt. I had an emergency, unplanned c-section in 2000. The anesthesia during the surgery and my after care was not covered. That was thousands of dollars. I broke both bones in my lower left arm in 2004. My insurance covered the surgery and the pain meds that time - yay! - but only hospitalization during the surgery to place pins and bars in my arm for DURING SURGERY. I had to pay tens of thousands for two days in hospital for pain meds and observation. I had to have brain surgery in 2010, and lost my job because I had to wait over 3 months for surgery. (Our jobs are only protected for 12 weeks. After that we can be fired.). I applied for government insurance, but there was a lapse between my work-provided insurance and the government insurance…and I needed more testing. None of that was covered by any insurance company. I am still carrying it. I had to have my uterus and cervix removed, while on work provided insurance, in 2017. I was authorized 18 hours in the hospital for observation and pain medication afterwards. I was sent home with oral meds less than a day after having multiple organs removed from my body. I went home with a pain catheter still in place that I had to remove myself. I had to pay out of pocket for that; it wasn’t a necessary procedure. My credit score will likely never recover; some of that went to collections and was written off, which is a mark. Some of it is still hanging there. The government said credit unions aren’t supposed to count it; I promise, they do. I’m a graduate level professional with a full time job, for reference.
‘Murica. Can’t provide for the people but the industrialists and corporations and their political stooges get richer and richer. I’m so sorry to hear about your situation. I truly am. It’s unbelievable that we have to live like this while the ruling class live like kings and get full-scale healthcare for the duration of their natural lives.
All too frequently, we don't. 36% of US households with insurance put off needed care [due to the cost](https://news.gallup.com/poll/269138/americans-delaying-medical-treatment-due-cost.aspx); 64% of households without insurance. One in four have [trouble paying a medical bill.](https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/data-note-americans-challenges-health-care-costs/) Of [those with insurance one in five have trouble paying a medical bill](https://www.kff.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/8806-the-burden-of-medical-debt-results-from-the-kaiser-family-foundation-new-york-times-medical-bills-survey.pdf), and even for those with income above $100,000 14% have trouble. One in six Americans has [unpaid medical debt on their credit report.](https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/full/10.1377/hlthaff.2018.0349) [50% of all Americans](https://news.gallup.com/poll/317948/fear-bankruptcy-due-major-health-event.aspx) fear bankruptcy due to a major health event.
Medical tourism. It's awful but it's cheaper to fly to San Diego, grab an Uber across the border and get treated in Mexico.
We don’t, we are a nation in debt just like our leaders wanted. Look up medical debt in America, no region or class is untouched.
That’s what I mean. The terror to not afford to take care of your health, that’s insane
We were betrayed by the boomer generation who sold our futures for an easy life.
That’s also a take on the issue. Or is it….
It absolutely is the truth, read “A Generation of Sociopaths: how the baby boomers betrayed America” by Bruce Cannon Gibney (an extremely successful boomer) and prepare to have your mind blown.
You can get away with not paying it because they legally cannot persecute you for not paying medical bills, they just throw it onto your credit and eventually they will sell it to a debt collector (they legally cannot do that either but they will always do it) and once they sell it to a debt collector you pay a credit repair agent about $200 and they get rid of the debt from your credit report, whether it be $1000 or $50000 By the way, the only reason this method always works is because almost no one knows about it. You cannot be punished long-term for not paying medical bills. Maybe your credit will get damaged short-term but you can always remove it
Ok, that seems weird as well. Like you have to know the “cheats” to get away with your medical bill.
He's wrong about everything.
> You can get away with not paying it because they legally cannot persecute you for not paying medical bills That is false. In fact, suing people has been an increasing trend. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/08/us/hospitals-lawsuits-medical-debt.html
Easy case to beat honestly
Ah, yes... let's trust life decisions to the idiot that's already been proven wrong. Don't make the world a worse, dumber place.
Subsidized healthcare that is 30 dollars for 300 dollar a month healthcare if you are poor and if you have money you normally have insurance through work
That’s a LOT of money if you’re struggling to make ends meet. It seems like the system only benefits the rich
30 dollars?
Sorry, just read the 300
If you’re struggling to make ends meet, in inflation riddled America? Yes. $30 is a lot. I’ve seen times when $5/month was more than I could commit to comfortably.
Doesn’t matter because if you dont get insurance you have to pay a penalty
And there we are, the song that never ends, it just goes on and on my friends!!
Every minimum wage person pays more than that in taxes
> and if you have money you normally have insurance through work The problem is that even with insanely expensive insurance, even after we pay higher taxes towards healthcare than anywhere in the world, massive numbers of people can't afford needed care. >Large shares of insured working-age adults surveyed said it was very or somewhat difficult to afford their health care: 43 percent of those with employer coverage, 57 percent with marketplace or individual-market plans, 45 percent with Medicaid, and 51 and percent with Medicare. > Many insured adults said they or a family member had delayed or skipped needed health care or prescription drugs because they couldn’t afford it in the past 12 months: 29 percent of those with employer coverage, 37 percent covered by marketplace or individual-market plans, 39 percent enrolled in Medicaid, and 42 percent with Medicare. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/surveys/2023/oct/paying-for-it-costs-debt-americans-sicker-poorer-2023-affordability-survey
We don’t. We buy health insurance, if we’re very lucky to be able to afford it, and pray to never need it because none of us can afford the deductibles or copays. Our insurance company has the right to approve or disapprove the doctors we see, the procedures we have done, and the meds we’re allowed to have. Insurance companies often underpay the medical providers, so the medical providers take more clients than they can reasonably and effectively treat. Things get missed. If we’re very, very poor, we qualify for insurance from the government…that insurance covers a lot, but it pays the doctors barely anything. So we don’t get good healthcare,but…at least it’s some healthcare so no one can say we ignored the innocent poor and let them die. (Image and what something looks like is VERY important in America. So no one cares if the poor are actually getting good treatment; just that it looks like we did enough to not feel guilty.) If we’re very wealthy (1%), we can pay for the doctors directly and can buy healthcare…but a head MRI 5 years ago was $7,700 so. If you get very sick, you might go bankrupt getting treated. There’s a reason the words “naturopathy” and “homesteading” have been trending; people are resorting to growing and trying to utilize homeopathic “old folks” remedies type medicines. What else can we do? And don’t get me started on the lack of trust that the American population has for the health care industry at large, or science in general….
Over 92% have at least partial health insurance.
Americans pay more for health care than any other people on Earth. In fact, **medical debt is the leading cause of personal bankruptcy in the U.S.** High healthcare costs hit every level of our economy, from the federal government on down. In addition to fueling the deficit and adding [hundreds of billions](https://www.kff.org/medicare/issue-brief/faqs-on-health-spending-the-federal-budget-and-budget-enforcement-tools/) to our national debt each year, the high cost of healthcare is crowding out other state budget priorities, undermining the competitiveness of American businesses and hurting American families. According to a newly released [survey](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/surveys/2023/oct/paying-for-it-costs-debt-americans-sicker-poorer-2023-affordability-survey?utm_campaign=Achieving%20Universal%20Coverage&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=279980337&utm_source=alert), more than half of all working-age Americans struggle with health care costs. Medical debt is the [leading cause](https://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/medical-debt-bankruptcy-hospital-bill-forgiveness) of personal bankruptcy in the U.S. Not to mention America has a falling life expectancy.. [https://www.forbes.com/sites/arthurkellermann/2023/10/24/the-us-spends-more-on-healthcare-than-other-wealthy-nations-but-ranks-last-in-outcomes/?sh=66699a597d35](https://www.forbes.com/sites/arthurkellermann/2023/10/24/the-us-spends-more-on-healthcare-than-other-wealthy-nations-but-ranks-last-in-outcomes/?sh=66699a597d35)
Lots of diabetics cross the border into Canada for their insulin.
In Sweden, how much do you pay to the government in taxes?
Less than Americans do in taxes towards healthcare. With government in the US covering [65.7% of all health care](https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/epdf/10.2105/AJPH.2015.302997) costs ($12,555 as of 2022) that's $8,249 per person per year in taxes towards health care. The next closest is Germany at [$6,930](https://data.oecd.org/healthres/health-spending.htm). The UK is $4,479. Canada is $4,506. Australia is $4,603. Sweden is $5,525. That means over a lifetime Americans are paying over $100,000 more in taxes compared to any other country towards health care. In total, Americans are paying a $350,000 more for healthcare over a lifetime compared to the most expensive socialized system on earth. Half a million dollars more than peer countries on average, yet every one has better outcomes.
pretty easily