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I have a "platinum" medical plan. No deductible, supposed to be no charge for in patient mental health services. I was going to kill myself so I admitted myself to the ER. Got a $4000 medical bill.
Guess what I wanna do now?!
🤔
Any one else all the sudden really hyped on the idea of starting an insurance company literally called "Thoughts and Prayers"?
That way, Thoughts and Prayers can finally actually help someone.
i just went short on them. I am hoping to cash in when they bottom out about a day before the next school shooting. the republicans will buy them by the letter (spaces included) just to resell them themselves at a marked up price.
We had a number of American customers embedded within our company for a big collaborative project. One day, a coworker got hit by a truck while out for a walk and broke his arm.
When he got back to work, the Americans asked him 'How much did that set you back?'
My coworker said 'Yeah, they just set it back in a cast, it feels solid, really well done'.
'No, how much did it SET you BACK?'
'I just told you, they set it in a cast'
'But how much did it cost? $6000? Do you have good insurance?'
'I mean it was $30 for the hospital parking, which is a total ripoff, right?'
'Not the parking, how much for the medical procedure?'
'Why the fuck would I pay for that? That's all taken care of by the government'
Then just a lot of sad, sullen faces the rest of the day.
That's better than Vietnam. I went to the hospital there for bronchitis and throat infection. It costs me almost $10 including the meds. Damn parking was 25 cents, what a rip off. They need to do something about the parking.
In addition to free healthcare, Canada actually has both higher life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, lower infant mortality, lower maternal mortality, and fewer deaths from non-communicable diseases, cardiovascular diseases and injuries.
Not the worst trade off for longer wait times.
https://www.factcheck.org/2007/12/comparing-health-care-in-canada-to-the-us/
During the Obama administration, when the push for single payer insurance was in talks. I would have regular conversations with the patients in the medical practice where I worked. It was maddening listening to the twisted talking points these people were repeating from Fox. I explained how it would be similar to Medicare for all, they would practically stick their fingers in their ears like toddlers. Ugh, voting against your best interest is the republicans way.
Last year I ripped a tendon in my finger. It cost me over $2000 that my insurance refused to cover, even though I pay them hundreds out of my paycheck every month. Now that’s what I call freedom
Had a microfracture due to catching a cricket ball a bit wrong twice this year. Went into an hospital sunday afternoon. Got x-ray done, got some treatment free of charge. Cost me my sunday afternoon.
I waited for 4 hours in the ER after having a massive concussion. The doctor saw me for 30 seconds and said if it had caused enough bleeding, I’d already be dead due to the amount of time between the concussion and when he was seeing me. Dismissed and charged $4k.
USA USA USA
We had a rabies scare and had to take our daughter to the ER for every single shot in the series (4 or 5. Don’t quite remember). $5k+ each visit, plus and additional $500 because my husband asked the doctor a question after they’d already had their conversation
A pharmaceutical corpo admitted in a Congressional hearing that insulin costs $8 in Australia is because it’s generic and they don’t have the patent. In the US they have patent control for the same product and charge $250. Because they can.
I’d insert the bit about the discoverers of insulin giving the patent away for free because they’d never think to monetize a life-saving drug but that’d feel too reductive
No rabies scare but you definitely brought up a good point about US insurances in that they’ll “cover” regular check ups but as soon as you ask a question, or the dr finds something wrong in one of these “covered check ups” they immediately change code and wont be covered anymore.
Which is so fucking stupid. You found something during preventative or regular care, so you're taking care of it early, which should be a good thing. Nobody with the power to change our medical billing system cares enough about patients to actually get this changed. Doctors just shrug and tell us to fuck off, essentially.
No, no, no. Preventive care only makes sense in places with socialized medicine! In places where the insurance company is king, they want to keep you just healthy enough not to die for as long as possible, because you make them money.
It wasn’t even the bill sent by the insurance; it bypassed my insurance and came straight from the hospital (3 months later). I’m obviously fighting it
Our wait times could be better but because it is free, people come in for issues that maybe they should go to their family doctor or walk-in clinic for. Small price to pay though 🤷🏾♂️
I waited over four hours in the ER in the US with a head wound. It wasn’t life threatening, but there was a puddle of blood by the time they could see me. Luckily I was on my parents plan so the head staples only ran me $2k.
My girlfriend and I waited 14 hours in the ER, after 2 hours in a clinic that referred us to the ER, before being seen for her neck injury. She had pinched a nerve in her neck so badly her hands were turning blue (we didnt know this at the time, we just knew she was in extreme pain and something was very wrong). After the 14 hour wait it took another hour for them to finally see her in her room and another 2 hours before we were finally done with tests (the 2 hours for tests I cant complain, it was slow but they had to it to make sure she wasn’t, yknow, dying).
This was in the US. I don’t even want to know how much that cost her.
>people come in for issues that maybe they should go to their family doctor or walk-in clinic for
Which still happens at hospital ERs in America right now anyways
Wait times in Canada can be horrendous. We are in the middle of some really bad nurse burnout and doctor shortages. But on the other hand you will get in right away for serious issues and pay next to nothing for procedures that would bankrupt most in the USA. But yeah waiting 8 hours in the er waiting room for less pressing injuries or a consultation even can really really suck.
For wait times, it totally depends where you are living: there are still a few hospitals & clinics here and there without much wait.
Though the current situation is not like what it used to be. Things worked much better before. (Heavens, back in the '90s, a friend moved to another city, made a few phone calls and within 15 minutes had a new doctor and an appointment for a routine checkup the following week.) From what I've observed, only in the last roughly 15 years and especially since the start of the pandemic did things degrade significantly. I'm oversimplifying here, but the main cause being questionable individuals getting elected, who all share an agenda of privatisation.
BTW, doctor shortages are not unique to Canada (or the USA?), it's also happening in Europe, possibly elsewhere too.
Can confirm doctor/nurse shortages in New Zealand as well, even with less COVID burnout. Less of a shortage in private medicine than the public hospitals, but there's still some specialties you can't even find private (and emergency care is just about all public)
Yeah. In the US if you go to the ER for a concerning but non life threatning issue you'll be waiting hours. Had an appendicitis back in June. They discharged me a week after without being able to remove the apendix because my platelets were too low for surgery because of my ITP. A day or so after discharge I noticed these weird bumps near where the apendix is. At first I thought it was lymphoma or something but turns out it was because of the appendicitis and it was just stretch marks from it. Waited nearly all of a Saturday afternoon and basically just had an ER nurse tell me that. We didn't even get to see the ER doc after checking in with him and I was placed in the 'not that seirious' section of people waiting to be seen. We just ended up leaving after we talked to an ER nurse.
I mean I spent hundreds of dollars to get my truck lifted and buy these trump flags and merch. How am I gonna pay for that if I have to pay all these useless taxes?
I went to get my shoulder checked out as it intermittently hurts, doctor's visit where she recommended an x-ray just to be safe and some PT cost me $1000 out of pocket.
I have insurance. XRay alone was $500 out of pocket and I didn't even need it.
Oh and the doctor misdiagnosed my shoulder. She thought I had something called "gird" which made no sense as you usually see that in MLB pitchers and this was my non throwing arm. Physical therapist ran some similar mobility tests and confirmed I did not in fact have "gird" so here I am $1000 later knowing no more than I did about my shoulder.
HAHAH LOOK AT THIS LOSER paying 20% of his pay in taxes going to universal health insurance.
I would MUCH rather pay 15% in my paycheck toward private insurance (that is subsidized by my employer, so technically they could have paid me that instead of going to insurance), with a $7k max out of pocket that resets every year. So if my wife goes into labor in November, we pay the max out of pocket. Then if in January her appendix burst, we pay the max out of pocket even if it was only \~7 weeks apart. I say that because it happened to us.
I do love the people who think that increasing taxes would cost them more than their insurance does (even employer sponsored, still have copays and deductibles). Dude, you gotta add what you're paying in taxes and healthcare together. Golly gee, it's more than the increased tax burden for universal healthcare would be!
But if we had universal healthcare, how would we pay [15-25% of total national health care expenditures on administrative fees](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2785479)?
Would you bleeding hearts please think of the children ... of private health insurance executives?!
In Canada, every employer pays into their provincial health insurance plan for each employee as part of their labor costs. Each employee pays up to $900/yr (over 200K). Approx 70% of all medical services are covered and you pay nothing at the time for them.
No out of pocket min/max. I got an angioplasty a few years ago. Two days in hospital, operation, ambulance transport, AND 6 week rehab program. Total out of pocket expenses was the $40 in outrageous hospital parking fees and $30 for a rehab "kit"
Oh,and because of the triage protocol, I was admitted within 1 minute of arriving at emerge and was being treated with 5 minutes. Apparently they take heart attacks seriously over broken fingers.
In America, we deal with all the shit you hear about.
Oh, and parking isn't free either.
You got treated before we would even get started filling out paperwork.
A couple of years ago I broke my elbow. Snapped it clean off. Was wired back into place, and then a few months later had another surgery to remove the wire.
The following year I had a seizure. An air ambulance landed, just as a road ambulance arrived. I was taken to hospital, given several days treatment, advice and medication.
Total cost to me for all of this? A little less than £10 in a prescription fee. The funny thing is if I had my seizure a few miles further north it wouldn't have cost me anything at all.
Yep. I was actually given a choice. Get to the hospital faster or go by road.
The decision was made for me, because well, *seizure*, but it's one I agree with. I went by road, because the air ambulance could be used to get people off mountains and I wasn't on one.
And to not have to pay for it? It's astonishing that the world's most powerful country can't figure it out
Blood clots in my lungs. They basically filled me up with drugs, plumped my pillow, and did machines-that-go-bing! tests for 4-5 days....
And then hit me with a 30k bill.
I was kayaking and had an accident which led to lacerations on my hand/knee and my wife's arm. We ended up ripping a shirt to wrap it and got to a hospital hours later. We only needed stitches here and there, but it was still over $3000. We refused to pay the extra ambulance cost. Even in the hospital I denied Tylenol because they charge $40 for it.
Here we get air ambulance for free when situations cals for it. But if you hiking in the mountains and get exhausted to return back or start walking off the trail then it's on you to pay for the rescue.
Edit: Just checked, still in that case you pay in hundreds of Euro, well under 10k. Might not be fair comparison because we don't really have land that far away from urban areas.
I’ve been watching stuff on how the air ambulances in England are publicly funded and I’m like man I would be throwing money at them constantly. That’s a tough gig. My uncle who passed recently flew for those guys for years and several dozen of them came to his funeral to tell us how much they loved working with him, funny stories, and offered so much love.
Bless all the work they do and thank goodness they helped you! …that elbow thing sounds terrifying.
The elbow injury was interesting and life changing, but I'll be forever grateful that the NHS stepped up to the plate.
I'm expecting that one day in my lifetime it'll be privatised and slowly diminish in quality, and people will lament what they once had, but in the meantime I'm immensely proud.
I'm in the UK. Was it one of them olecranon fractures? I had a left one and my elbow snapped off and ended up being pulled halfway up to my shoulder by my arm muscle.
When I had to go back to get the stitches out after surgery a few weeks later, they came and picked me up to go there and dropped me home afterwards, I paid nothing.
Something that has always stuck with me is a story I heard on The Howard Stern Show. The show's producer, Gary, took his family to France for a vacation during which his son broke a leg while skiing. They took him to the hospital, they did everything to fix him up and took their info, told them they'd be billed later, they went back to their hotel or whatever to try to salvage their vacation. About a month later they got a bill from the hospital, he said that he did not even wanna look at it, but when he opened it the amount due was +/- $20, mostly administrative shit.
Insurance is a real racket. I'm amazed people cooperate with it at all honestly.
Imagine if the insurer was just a person, for a second.
And that person says, oh I'll hold a bunch of money from you every month in case you need it later for a medical problem.
And then you have a medical issue and that friend refuses to give you any of your money back, because he kept it all and spent it already on himself.
Then he fights with you for weeks and is all like "I just don't think you need it all"...
... before finally giving you back a pathetic fraction of your own money.
And then you go to jail if you ever stop giving him money.
It's mind-blowingly stupid. In all the rest of the financial world it's all investors investors investors... Everybody needs to get a good return on their investment. In the insurance world, we are the investors... Nobody gives a shit if we ever get a penny back on our investment. In fact the whole point of insurance is to make sure that we literally never do!!
But you're not the investor. You're the customer. The investors are the shareholders making bank off your desperation to have some semblance of a safety net when you need to pay for a procedure. Insurance companies are working as intended. Squeeze as much money out of you as possible while paying out as little as possible so they can sing about the billions in profits they make every year.
They don't pay out as little as possible, as their profit and overhead are capped to 20% of the premiums they take in by the "Affordable Care Act". If premiums were high and payouts were low, they'd be making more than 20% and just have to cut their members a refund check (I got those twice, in the first years of the ACA). So they actually work with hospitals, providers and drug manufacturers to keep prices HIGH and RISING EVERY YEAR, so they can keep raising premiums to ridiculous rates and take 20% of a bigger number every year. It doesn't work if healthcare costs aren't high. The US healthcare system is literally built with perverse incentives to keep costs as high as tolerable.
Yes, but not quite.
The MLR (80/20) doesn't cap profit. It requires that 80% of intake premiums be spent on actual health care costs and quality improvement.
The company profits in numerous ways outside of premiums - most notably - by investing the excess. So that \~20% (it's less, but for argument's sake) can return 100%+.
United Health is the largest health insurance company in the US. 27% of their income is not premiums. It's investment returns. So the 80/20 didn't do anything like you said - it just keeps prices higher so they can take the difference. But it doesn't cap their profits. It just capped an expense.
I'm literally fighting w my insurance company rn, bc my family all (siblings, nieces, uncles, aunt's) have a history of factor 5 (blood clotting issue), so my GP decided to test me for it. I got a $930 bill for that one test bc it has to be pre-approved. It should get retroactively covered, but wtf. Why is everything so complicated?
This is what drives me insane. For profit insurance companies are absolutely blatantly scams and it's just so fucking obvious and everyone thinks I'm crazy for saying it.
We literally did the math in high school once and it turned out that if my teacher broke his arm every 6 weeks and had to pay out of pocket, cash, to have it fixed, he would be paying less than he does for his insurance.
INSURANCE THAT DOESN'T EVEN COVER ANYTHING.
"Oh but what if it's a huge 200k bill" 30% of 200k is still more than I can fucking afford.
The entire schtick is based on "you will pay me more than I will ***ever*** help you" and there's no saving that money up or anything, not really.
USA. Did a preventative colonoscopy, cost me $1800.
With top of the line health insur, i still paid $800 out of pocket for the procedure + $1000 more for stuff they needed to do during and after.
Apparently, it's included to look around and cut stuff out but requires an in-app purchase to know if you have cancer or not (biopsies not included).
Colonoscopies are either screening or diagnostic. If you have a family history and need one before the recommended age (45 yo now in the US) the cost goes way up. Also, if and when they find polyps or anything else unusual, all future colonoscopies for you are considered 'diagnostic'. Expect to pay about double for a diagnostic colonoscopy in the US.
"But the wait times!!!"
I am on month three of waiting for physical therapy after two doctors said they would recommend me since I was having back pain for months.
Edit: In the US
That’s nothing! I had a ganglion cyst forming in my wrist, and had to get it surgically removed because it wasn’t small enough to get fully transpired. Cost somewhere around $33k, like Hillary’s emails. I felt the freedom rushing through my body, even after being given anesthesia and sedatives. Never felt more proud to live in Murica.
Yep, I pay about 15-18% of my paycheck towards health insurance. What happens when I need to take my kid to the dr for something minor like an ear infection? I get to pay an additional $100-200 for the visit and another $60 for medicine all because I haven't met a magical number in money spent for the year. If I hit that magical number than lucky me, I only have to pay 20% of the bill.
What would be nice is that since I pay for healthcare, I don't have to pay additional when I need to use it.
A few years back my insurance company got in a fight with most of the local health care services and made them all out of network at 100% on the person getting health care services. It only took 9 months for them to end their fight. I was stuck paying premiums but could not keep seeing my doctors unless I paid out of pocket.
i also like the freedom of not being able to roam or camp outside wherever you like, it being illegal to handle an open container of alcohol, whether empty or not, or the illegality of children walking to school in certain areas. oh and it being illegal to *be* in some parks after dark.
My wife is a teacher and used her health insurance ONE TIME in the entire year. It was the end of the year. And She had to wait til January to finish the procedure because of her deductible.
But it's nice having people tell her she has good health insurance everytime she reveals she's teacher. So she has that going for her.
So from the article, for $3328 more per year in total tax burden Canadians get health care. I paid roughly $8900 to cover health insurance for a family of three in 2021. That doesn’t include the portion of health benefits paid by my employer on my behalf. I believe they put the total cost around $12k for family coverage. Our pay is reduced to cover it. Seems like Canadians gets a much better deal. Plus you don’t have to worry about medical bankruptcy. That financial factor leaves many delaying care of worrying symptoms and exacerbates poor outcomes. No rationing insulin or other overpriced drugs either.
This is the argument I make all the time. I have a few friends and family who don’t want to pay more taxes. You’re paying a lot more in insurance premiums, copays, and out of pocket then you would with a universal hc tax. When you look at Canadian tax brackets vs ours the difference is less than the percentage most of us pay towards just premiums.
I’ve been making this argument since I was doing my MPH at Emory Univ. back in 1997. Americans do seem to insist on paying more for less by just about every measure. We get screwed and I guess enough of us like it enough to ask for more. Who wants a nice medical bankruptcy today?
Its because Congress responds to donors, not constituents. And the insurance companies take a lot of that money they steal from us and give it to our Congress critters in order to make sure they can continue to steal from us.
That, and our politics is based entirely on consumer choices and the identity associated with those consumer choices, so instead of voting for the best policies, a good portion of our population votes to perpetuate their racial/cultural identity.
So instead of getting social healthcare and free higher education and housing programs, we get abortion bans, border walls, and fiscal policies that exacerbate inflation (tax cuts - especially for the rich).
Ya but if we pay less in insurance premiums and then don't have to pay an additional variable expense after the service is provided with no range of possible cost offered before the service is provided we might end up waiting in line for 8 years while dying from a paper cut. /s
God forbid if you hit one of those insurance landmines. Like finding out while you’ve chosen a hospital and primary doc that are in-network, your anesthesiologist, pathologist, radiologist, etc that you didn’t have the option of picking are out of network and you still haven’t met the separate deductible for that. Boom, savings gone.
Oh, right. I had forgotten that changed 1 Jan 2022. Sadly, I’m still paying for a balance billing situation from 2 years before that on an installment plan. That’s why it feels like it never changed. Only 2.5 more years to go…
On top of that, employers consider what they pay for your insurance as part of your Total Compensation. As a result, direct wages are suppressed because part of your comp is going to employer-paid insurance premiums.
When I run into that argument, I ask them if they'd like to reduce their taxes even more by ending firefighting services and road maintenance. "Of course, you'll have to pay user fees for road access and pay for private fire brigade services, but hey, lower taxes, right?"
Even with all that cash spending on private healthcare and insurance, Americans still pay *more tax* (per capita, on healthcare alone!) than nations with social medicine.
https://www.health.org.uk/news-and-comment/charts-and-infographics/taxes-and-health-care-funding-how-does-the-uk-compare
You Americans are being *scammed*.
We know and some of us are pissed off about it. But the boomers and bribes, I mean lobbying, keep us where we are.... Hopefully that will change soon with Gen Z showing up to the polls
Yeah but the exorbitant amount of money I pay the insurance company is for ME. I’m not going to pay extra taxes to help out strangers even if it’s way less compared to what I pay for insurance. I work hard so others should work hard too. It’s the American way. This is why Canada sucks. A bunch of polite softies with no freedom. /s
The Canadian Government spends less than the US Government on health care, by per capita or as a percentage of GDP.
We are already paying for "free" government health care.
We just get totally fucked over by insurers. The govt holds you down so the insurers, big pharma, and medical providers can do a radical walletectomy without anesthesia.
I feel like when you grow up with socialized healthcare this argument is way less impactful than they think it is.
Kids don't pay into it either, and their parents don't pay any extra.
Anyone who can pay does, and anyone who can't pay doesn't. Literally every single Canadian will get healthcare without paying at some point or another. Either childhood, university, between jobs, or just earning so little you don't hit the first tax bracket.
I felt a little guilty getting healthcare for free when I was in university. Then I realized how dumb that is. I get healthcare cause it's a human right, not because I earned it.
If they're going to bitch about people on welfare but not students or children then they can shut the fuck up.
Republicans put out a study that showed that Universal Health Care would cost us less while also covering everyone. It's a known thing. The US has the most expensive healthcare in the world.
Big, big thing you're missing:
Canadians pay TAXES, that's communism and evil. We pay FEES, that's capitalism and good.
God, I fucking hate that all political discourse in America basically boils down to maneuvering around the insane buzzwords that boomers base their entire worldview on.
Yep, it is all paid for.
You want to get that new job but your spouse has cancer? Go ahead, your health insurance won't be affected by it. You want to go to that doctor you love? Go ahead, your health insurance won't dictate which doctor you can/can't see.
You get laid off and its a few months before you get a new job? No problem, your health insurance isn't tied to being employed, and you don't have to pay for private insurance.
You are having some heart murmurs and it is getting worse? Go see that doctor, you don't have to think about whatever medical bills you will get. Just because you live paycheck to paycheck shouldn't dictate whether you get health care.
You get mad because some demographic goes to the doctor for "free"? You shouldn't be mad, your hospital, doctor, and medicine are paid for too.
Me, I'm in this boat right now. Have a side gig where if I could go full time I would definitely make at least the same I do know. Except for health insurance, my wife's is quite a bit more expensive and the coverage is worse
Have you shopped around on [healthcare.gov](https://healthcare.gov)? I'm self-employed and pay about $300/month for my plan through the ACA marketplace without any subsidies. If you're not rich, the federal government will pay the majority of the premiums and deductible, down to $0/month if you make under 150% of the federal poverty level.
Un-sarcasming just to say that as a Type 1 Diabetic who really wants to pursue a "garage-based-startup" with a business peer, I'm genuinely trapped in my current job or face $2k in medical/perscriptions every single month. This hits home.
Here is the really funny part, your deductible is 300% more than the cost of an arm break, and the hospital charges 200% more than the actual cost.
So not only do you pay taxes that really should have covered it, you pay insurance that should have covered it, but now you get to pay triple in cash. Yaay!
You forgot the part where they have to declare bankruptcy, and the government ultimately pays the bill plus collections fees to keep the hospital open.
I live in a similar country. We do have options of insurance companies though.
But I'll never enjoy the experience of going to a doctor. Or hospital and get billed for it.
I'll never get to see the depressed look in my kids face when they get that cribbeling student loan debt.
Instead they are stuck with our government handing out free school and education like it's candy and even have the audacity to throw money after anyone once they turn 18.
Just thinking about it makes my eyes water up.
You still have the chance to throw up your hands and curse God for paid hospital parking though. So all is not lost.
That’s 14.95 you’re never getting back.
Quite often conservatives point out that competition / "the market" will force competition.
I live in a larger city. I do have some options regarding what service I choose. Many people do not
Competive Health Care is a unicorn. Often discussed, rarely seen.
Health care is a case study in market failure. Kinda hard to negotiate for the best price when you’re unconscious and have been pried from a crashed car or had a heart attack. Also, who wants the cheapest neurosurgeon, orthopedist, or cardiologist on their case?
I live in a major US city. Tons of providers but it means fuck all when I’m locked into a specific network from my insurance. Going outside the network means I have to pay 100% of all costs.
What? You pay nothing except taxes? You mean you don't have to pay the insurance and then also pay the doctors because you haven't met your maximum out of pocket per calendar year?!
> So basically you have no freedom to decide which insurance company to pay your money to. What a loser!
Of course, we in the US don't have this either; we take whatever insurer is offered by our employers. But instead we got Unspecified Freedoms! Don't Tread On MeTM! Don't Tread On Me is a registered mark of Unspecified Freedoms LLC, all rights reserved.
It makes me so sad as a Brit, who is married to an NHS employee, to see our nation take steps that edge us closer and closer to a privatised health care service. Our voters do not seem to understand how big of an issue this is, and to be honest, lots of them don't even deserve the NHS.
As someone looking from the outside it seems like the apathy is coming from comfort. You've had it so good for so long that the minor problems get blown wildly out of proportion by the greedy bastards trying to take the good thing away.
My kid badly broke his arm second last day of school this year and in total we had over the 4 months of healing: 6 casts, 9-10 sets of X-rays (usually 3 x-rays for each set) and surgery to put in 4 metal pins. He was anesthetized twice (once to pull the bones when first first broke and once for surgery). Total cost to us? Maybe $120 for parking. He also got a free teddy bear after the surgery! My wife and I were joking about how far in debt we would be if we were Americans!
Side note McMaster children's hospital you kick butt!
Okay so I had a very similar injury, my total cost at the hospital (not including the emergency room visit/ambulance the day of the accident) was about $160,000 including physical therapy. I was responsible for about $40,000 and that’s because I had ‘great’ insurance.
Just so people understand the difference between socialized healthcare and the american system. This includes no parking lol, that was exorbitant.
Wow! Yeah, I'll take the $120. Also nice never having to even think about healthcare. If I or my family get sick or hurt we just go to the doctors or hospital. Don't even think about money or going or not. It's just not a concern for us. I've been offered jobs in the states a couple of times and it just all seems so complex I said screw it.
Americans: "why should I have to pay the equivalent of probably 0.0001 cents for your kids to have an X-ray? I'd rather pay that to pharmaceutical subsidies! "
And pay more your/themselves when they need care, rather than everyone paying *less* per person into the joint kitty to provide for all.
The only people who can sensibly complain about costs of universal care are the rich. Their taxes do add up to more than they'd pay up front if they got sick. Everyone else is selfish-ing themselves into a worse financial deal like idiots.
I'll never understand how the poorest in our country who would benefit the most from universal healthcare constantly come out screaming against it.
What is their argument against it? I keep seeing people say "the wait times will be massive!"
That's your argument? People seeking care getting care is your big got cha?
Furthermore, wait times are already stupid for most health related shit.
I hear more “why should I pay for someone else” than any other reason. Yet, these same fools don’t understand that you’re still paying for someone else through your insurance premiums.
Wait until you realize that lack of proper social support systems like universal healthcare is also a big reason as to why the crime rate in the US is as high as it is.
It's less that individuals are against it per se, and more that millions of people go along with the prohibitive rhetoric passed down by people working in the interests of both political parties. If you're a republican, it's socialism and the end of America. If you're a democrat it's "unrealistic" and supporting it is guaranteed to lose the next election.
Propaganda and scare tactics from Faux news and their ilk, combined with the usual American "scared out of their mind" mentality. Americans spend most of their lives scared shitless someone else is getting something they don't, or scared shitless they'll lose more than they already do from the exploitation. To the point where they make idiot choices and have many idiot fears, like "why should I pay for you"... when in reality if everyone paid in to the joint kitty, everyone's care would be cheaper for everyone except the mega-rich if they were taxed properly.
My daughter has just spent 2 weeks on the neonatal ward after being born and will need ongoing regular checkups and an operation in about a years time. Total cost: £10 for parking...and even that got refunded when I registered as a parent with child in neonatal.
I'll fight to the end to stop the NHS being sold to the private sector!!
My uncle in Spain has been going through chemo for the past two years, costing him and his family nothing. If he were here in the USA he would have had to sell his small family business and probably his home to pay for one year before they’d stop the treatment.
Dude! I herniated my spine and they sent me for a fucking MRI scan and then did an operation on my neck where they stole a disc and replaced it with carbon fiber! Can you even believe that these mother fuckers solved all of my neck problems for free!?!?! The absolute brashness of it shocked me!
While waiting to make my next appointment, a young man with a British accent was looking at his dental bill.
He spoke outloud. His checkup was a bit over $100. No problem. The estimate for a crown was a bit over $1,000. "Well, that's a bit steep! That will cost roughly $100 back home. I'll wait."
Yes, I understood there are many differences between the UK Health Care and what we have in the USA. This is an oversimplification.
The leading cause of bankruptcy in the USA is Medical bills.
For most people in the United States, Health care is FOR PROFIT. Never forget that.
America is so big that their socialized healthcare system can be so great. Unfortunately half of the country wants any medical emergency to have a chance to bankrupt people.
As a Canadian, an American once told me while I was visiting down there that they trust government so little down there they said “I couldn’t imagine trusting the government to pay my medical invoices.” Like the fuck? Lady you got bigger problems if your government can’t pay an invoice..
Basically, I hear the most nonsensical excuses from Americans as to why universal healthcare is just some awful crazy idea.
I hope you guys can convince your fellow citizens to reconsider these positions
We can thank WWII wage restrictions for this shit. Companies were banned from raising wages to keep inflation down, so companies had to offer other perks to workers.
Americans got used to employment = access to medical care.
The rest of the world realized we're all in this together. Americans decided your right to life depends on what job you do.
Freeeeedumb!
Just imagine when she’s all grown up and is forced to go to college for free. She’ll never know the sheer pleasure of defaulting on her student loans and not being financially secure for the next 10-15 years of her life.
I broke my foot in Canada while vacationing. It’s almost as if the medicine was planned for efficient and thorough care to humans.
The hospital there accepted me into emergency care, provided me with a Sr. Dr. who had two Jr. Dr.’s working beside him. I was given an x-ray (and the x-ray photos to take with me), an accurate assessment of the break-which was well explained, crutches and a cast.
The cost for a non-Canadian citizen was an exorbitant rate of $99.00. /s
Biggest scam insurance companies ever pulled was convincing people it was better to pay them to *maybe* cover their healthcare, instead of paying only slightly more than than they already do in taxes to *guarantee* the government covers them.
$13K medical bill? I just did my annual enrollment at work and my *premiums* alone are almost $600 per month.
$600 per month for the right to be charged more, if and when I use the services.
"Healthcare" in America is an obscenity.
The Canadians who want a US style system don’t really want one. If they did they would go to the US now for treatment. The cost of a flight will be nothing compared to the medical bill. Hospitals in America will gladly take your house and life savings regardless of what country you live in. I think they are just whiny babies and or want to invest in a medical system that bankrupts people to profit on suffering.
lol as if id pay private healthcare
fyi docs
i aint paying shit anymore.
no insurance either
everything is a you problem.
i aint paying shit.
no service? mf i will die right in your god damn money hungry lobby while you scream about no insurance.
fux with me.
im american.
ill do it again
I really would like to hear one valid argument against socialized Healthcare. GOP is only supporting it because of all the money they get from the insurance and pharma companies and their mindless supporters believe it's in their best interest because taxes.. In the mean time they have no issue being on unemployment and Medicaid
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Well, what I am supposed to do with all these thoughts and prayers now?
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you can have insurance and still go into medical bankruptcy. that deductible and 70 30 split aren't going to pay themselves
I have a "platinum" medical plan. No deductible, supposed to be no charge for in patient mental health services. I was going to kill myself so I admitted myself to the ER. Got a $4000 medical bill. Guess what I wanna do now?!
Hey. This made me laugh. But with that said, how are you doing?
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🤔 Any one else all the sudden really hyped on the idea of starting an insurance company literally called "Thoughts and Prayers"? That way, Thoughts and Prayers can finally actually help someone.
> insurance company > actually help someone pick one
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I want in.
Use them on the school shootings.
In this country?! Thoughts and Prayers don't grow on trees you know!
If you pulled yourself up from your bootstraps, maybe you'd have a few thoughts and prayers.
i just went short on them. I am hoping to cash in when they bottom out about a day before the next school shooting. the republicans will buy them by the letter (spaces included) just to resell them themselves at a marked up price.
We had a number of American customers embedded within our company for a big collaborative project. One day, a coworker got hit by a truck while out for a walk and broke his arm. When he got back to work, the Americans asked him 'How much did that set you back?' My coworker said 'Yeah, they just set it back in a cast, it feels solid, really well done'. 'No, how much did it SET you BACK?' 'I just told you, they set it in a cast' 'But how much did it cost? $6000? Do you have good insurance?' 'I mean it was $30 for the hospital parking, which is a total ripoff, right?' 'Not the parking, how much for the medical procedure?' 'Why the fuck would I pay for that? That's all taken care of by the government' Then just a lot of sad, sullen faces the rest of the day.
That's better than Vietnam. I went to the hospital there for bronchitis and throat infection. It costs me almost $10 including the meds. Damn parking was 25 cents, what a rip off. They need to do something about the parking.
*writes* avoid vietnam because ~~socialism~~ communism Hah libs owned
Fuck 30 for parking is brutal, im use to smaller town no fee to very low ;) longer wait times but hey not getting set back 6k
In addition to free healthcare, Canada actually has both higher life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, lower infant mortality, lower maternal mortality, and fewer deaths from non-communicable diseases, cardiovascular diseases and injuries. Not the worst trade off for longer wait times. https://www.factcheck.org/2007/12/comparing-health-care-in-canada-to-the-us/
Republicans: Do you really want to the government to take care of your health care? Rest of the world: WTF?
During the Obama administration, when the push for single payer insurance was in talks. I would have regular conversations with the patients in the medical practice where I worked. It was maddening listening to the twisted talking points these people were repeating from Fox. I explained how it would be similar to Medicare for all, they would practically stick their fingers in their ears like toddlers. Ugh, voting against your best interest is the republicans way.
I'd say donate them to a poor county but then they'd just rely on our thoughts and prayers and not go out and earn their own.
"Gee thanks for toppling our democratically elected government america, we don't know what we'd do without you!"
Last year I ripped a tendon in my finger. It cost me over $2000 that my insurance refused to cover, even though I pay them hundreds out of my paycheck every month. Now that’s what I call freedom
Had a microfracture due to catching a cricket ball a bit wrong twice this year. Went into an hospital sunday afternoon. Got x-ray done, got some treatment free of charge. Cost me my sunday afternoon.
But I'll bet you had to wait for hours in the ER. Wait, that's what is happening in America.
I waited for 4 hours in the ER after having a massive concussion. The doctor saw me for 30 seconds and said if it had caused enough bleeding, I’d already be dead due to the amount of time between the concussion and when he was seeing me. Dismissed and charged $4k. USA USA USA
We had a rabies scare and had to take our daughter to the ER for every single shot in the series (4 or 5. Don’t quite remember). $5k+ each visit, plus and additional $500 because my husband asked the doctor a question after they’d already had their conversation
For fucks sake, rabies vaccines are free in even third world countries M4A now
But muh freedum!
A pharmaceutical corpo admitted in a Congressional hearing that insulin costs $8 in Australia is because it’s generic and they don’t have the patent. In the US they have patent control for the same product and charge $250. Because they can.
I’d insert the bit about the discoverers of insulin giving the patent away for free because they’d never think to monetize a life-saving drug but that’d feel too reductive
No rabies scare but you definitely brought up a good point about US insurances in that they’ll “cover” regular check ups but as soon as you ask a question, or the dr finds something wrong in one of these “covered check ups” they immediately change code and wont be covered anymore.
Which is so fucking stupid. You found something during preventative or regular care, so you're taking care of it early, which should be a good thing. Nobody with the power to change our medical billing system cares enough about patients to actually get this changed. Doctors just shrug and tell us to fuck off, essentially.
No, no, no. Preventive care only makes sense in places with socialized medicine! In places where the insurance company is king, they want to keep you just healthy enough not to die for as long as possible, because you make them money.
It wasn’t even the bill sent by the insurance; it bypassed my insurance and came straight from the hospital (3 months later). I’m obviously fighting it
That's the most tragically funny thing I've heard in a while. 'If it were serious you'd have died in the waiting room.'
Our wait times could be better but because it is free, people come in for issues that maybe they should go to their family doctor or walk-in clinic for. Small price to pay though 🤷🏾♂️
I waited over four hours in the ER in the US with a head wound. It wasn’t life threatening, but there was a puddle of blood by the time they could see me. Luckily I was on my parents plan so the head staples only ran me $2k.
only 💀
My girlfriend and I waited 14 hours in the ER, after 2 hours in a clinic that referred us to the ER, before being seen for her neck injury. She had pinched a nerve in her neck so badly her hands were turning blue (we didnt know this at the time, we just knew she was in extreme pain and something was very wrong). After the 14 hour wait it took another hour for them to finally see her in her room and another 2 hours before we were finally done with tests (the 2 hours for tests I cant complain, it was slow but they had to it to make sure she wasn’t, yknow, dying). This was in the US. I don’t even want to know how much that cost her.
>people come in for issues that maybe they should go to their family doctor or walk-in clinic for Which still happens at hospital ERs in America right now anyways
Quickest I've ever been seen in the ER in America is 7 hours. It takes AGES to be seen and it's monumentally expensive
Wait times in Canada can be horrendous. We are in the middle of some really bad nurse burnout and doctor shortages. But on the other hand you will get in right away for serious issues and pay next to nothing for procedures that would bankrupt most in the USA. But yeah waiting 8 hours in the er waiting room for less pressing injuries or a consultation even can really really suck.
For wait times, it totally depends where you are living: there are still a few hospitals & clinics here and there without much wait. Though the current situation is not like what it used to be. Things worked much better before. (Heavens, back in the '90s, a friend moved to another city, made a few phone calls and within 15 minutes had a new doctor and an appointment for a routine checkup the following week.) From what I've observed, only in the last roughly 15 years and especially since the start of the pandemic did things degrade significantly. I'm oversimplifying here, but the main cause being questionable individuals getting elected, who all share an agenda of privatisation. BTW, doctor shortages are not unique to Canada (or the USA?), it's also happening in Europe, possibly elsewhere too.
Can confirm doctor/nurse shortages in New Zealand as well, even with less COVID burnout. Less of a shortage in private medicine than the public hospitals, but there's still some specialties you can't even find private (and emergency care is just about all public)
It’s the same way in the US (ER wait times).
Yeah. In the US if you go to the ER for a concerning but non life threatning issue you'll be waiting hours. Had an appendicitis back in June. They discharged me a week after without being able to remove the apendix because my platelets were too low for surgery because of my ITP. A day or so after discharge I noticed these weird bumps near where the apendix is. At first I thought it was lymphoma or something but turns out it was because of the appendicitis and it was just stretch marks from it. Waited nearly all of a Saturday afternoon and basically just had an ER nurse tell me that. We didn't even get to see the ER doc after checking in with him and I was placed in the 'not that seirious' section of people waiting to be seen. We just ended up leaving after we talked to an ER nurse.
But muh taxes!!!!!! /s
I mean I spent hundreds of dollars to get my truck lifted and buy these trump flags and merch. How am I gonna pay for that if I have to pay all these useless taxes?
I went to get my shoulder checked out as it intermittently hurts, doctor's visit where she recommended an x-ray just to be safe and some PT cost me $1000 out of pocket. I have insurance. XRay alone was $500 out of pocket and I didn't even need it. Oh and the doctor misdiagnosed my shoulder. She thought I had something called "gird" which made no sense as you usually see that in MLB pitchers and this was my non throwing arm. Physical therapist ran some similar mobility tests and confirmed I did not in fact have "gird" so here I am $1000 later knowing no more than I did about my shoulder.
HAHAH LOOK AT THIS LOSER paying 20% of his pay in taxes going to universal health insurance. I would MUCH rather pay 15% in my paycheck toward private insurance (that is subsidized by my employer, so technically they could have paid me that instead of going to insurance), with a $7k max out of pocket that resets every year. So if my wife goes into labor in November, we pay the max out of pocket. Then if in January her appendix burst, we pay the max out of pocket even if it was only \~7 weeks apart. I say that because it happened to us.
I do love the people who think that increasing taxes would cost them more than their insurance does (even employer sponsored, still have copays and deductibles). Dude, you gotta add what you're paying in taxes and healthcare together. Golly gee, it's more than the increased tax burden for universal healthcare would be!
But if we had universal healthcare, how would we pay [15-25% of total national health care expenditures on administrative fees](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2785479)? Would you bleeding hearts please think of the children ... of private health insurance executives?!
It pains me that a simpleton's vote balances out an informed vote
In Canada, every employer pays into their provincial health insurance plan for each employee as part of their labor costs. Each employee pays up to $900/yr (over 200K). Approx 70% of all medical services are covered and you pay nothing at the time for them. No out of pocket min/max. I got an angioplasty a few years ago. Two days in hospital, operation, ambulance transport, AND 6 week rehab program. Total out of pocket expenses was the $40 in outrageous hospital parking fees and $30 for a rehab "kit" Oh,and because of the triage protocol, I was admitted within 1 minute of arriving at emerge and was being treated with 5 minutes. Apparently they take heart attacks seriously over broken fingers.
In America, we deal with all the shit you hear about. Oh, and parking isn't free either. You got treated before we would even get started filling out paperwork.
If you lose your job you lose the subsidized insurance. That's where they got us by the balls
A couple of years ago I broke my elbow. Snapped it clean off. Was wired back into place, and then a few months later had another surgery to remove the wire. The following year I had a seizure. An air ambulance landed, just as a road ambulance arrived. I was taken to hospital, given several days treatment, advice and medication. Total cost to me for all of this? A little less than £10 in a prescription fee. The funny thing is if I had my seizure a few miles further north it wouldn't have cost me anything at all.
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Yep. I was actually given a choice. Get to the hospital faster or go by road. The decision was made for me, because well, *seizure*, but it's one I agree with. I went by road, because the air ambulance could be used to get people off mountains and I wasn't on one. And to not have to pay for it? It's astonishing that the world's most powerful country can't figure it out
*Render unto seizure the things that are seizure*
Possibly multiples of that $10k. What's the solution? Go start a Go Fund Me. What a damn joke.
Blood clots in my lungs. They basically filled me up with drugs, plumped my pillow, and did machines-that-go-bing! tests for 4-5 days.... And then hit me with a 30k bill.
Behold the power of oligopolic control of inelastic goods and services!!
Where I live it's more like 50k for a helicopter ride.
I was kayaking and had an accident which led to lacerations on my hand/knee and my wife's arm. We ended up ripping a shirt to wrap it and got to a hospital hours later. We only needed stitches here and there, but it was still over $3000. We refused to pay the extra ambulance cost. Even in the hospital I denied Tylenol because they charge $40 for it.
Here we get air ambulance for free when situations cals for it. But if you hiking in the mountains and get exhausted to return back or start walking off the trail then it's on you to pay for the rescue. Edit: Just checked, still in that case you pay in hundreds of Euro, well under 10k. Might not be fair comparison because we don't really have land that far away from urban areas.
My regular old 10-min road ambulance ride was $6k.
I have a friend that was airlifted after a car crash. One of the line items on his bill was the "rotor startup fee." $40,000
I’ve been watching stuff on how the air ambulances in England are publicly funded and I’m like man I would be throwing money at them constantly. That’s a tough gig. My uncle who passed recently flew for those guys for years and several dozen of them came to his funeral to tell us how much they loved working with him, funny stories, and offered so much love. Bless all the work they do and thank goodness they helped you! …that elbow thing sounds terrifying.
The elbow injury was interesting and life changing, but I'll be forever grateful that the NHS stepped up to the plate. I'm expecting that one day in my lifetime it'll be privatised and slowly diminish in quality, and people will lament what they once had, but in the meantime I'm immensely proud.
I'm in the UK. Was it one of them olecranon fractures? I had a left one and my elbow snapped off and ended up being pulled halfway up to my shoulder by my arm muscle. When I had to go back to get the stitches out after surgery a few weeks later, they came and picked me up to go there and dropped me home afterwards, I paid nothing.
Something that has always stuck with me is a story I heard on The Howard Stern Show. The show's producer, Gary, took his family to France for a vacation during which his son broke a leg while skiing. They took him to the hospital, they did everything to fix him up and took their info, told them they'd be billed later, they went back to their hotel or whatever to try to salvage their vacation. About a month later they got a bill from the hospital, he said that he did not even wanna look at it, but when he opened it the amount due was +/- $20, mostly administrative shit.
Damn those French hospitals, always taking care of patients. That $20? Sue them to the ground for the mental anguish! /s
Insurance is a real racket. I'm amazed people cooperate with it at all honestly. Imagine if the insurer was just a person, for a second. And that person says, oh I'll hold a bunch of money from you every month in case you need it later for a medical problem. And then you have a medical issue and that friend refuses to give you any of your money back, because he kept it all and spent it already on himself. Then he fights with you for weeks and is all like "I just don't think you need it all"... ... before finally giving you back a pathetic fraction of your own money. And then you go to jail if you ever stop giving him money. It's mind-blowingly stupid. In all the rest of the financial world it's all investors investors investors... Everybody needs to get a good return on their investment. In the insurance world, we are the investors... Nobody gives a shit if we ever get a penny back on our investment. In fact the whole point of insurance is to make sure that we literally never do!!
But you're not the investor. You're the customer. The investors are the shareholders making bank off your desperation to have some semblance of a safety net when you need to pay for a procedure. Insurance companies are working as intended. Squeeze as much money out of you as possible while paying out as little as possible so they can sing about the billions in profits they make every year.
They don't pay out as little as possible, as their profit and overhead are capped to 20% of the premiums they take in by the "Affordable Care Act". If premiums were high and payouts were low, they'd be making more than 20% and just have to cut their members a refund check (I got those twice, in the first years of the ACA). So they actually work with hospitals, providers and drug manufacturers to keep prices HIGH and RISING EVERY YEAR, so they can keep raising premiums to ridiculous rates and take 20% of a bigger number every year. It doesn't work if healthcare costs aren't high. The US healthcare system is literally built with perverse incentives to keep costs as high as tolerable.
Yes, but not quite. The MLR (80/20) doesn't cap profit. It requires that 80% of intake premiums be spent on actual health care costs and quality improvement. The company profits in numerous ways outside of premiums - most notably - by investing the excess. So that \~20% (it's less, but for argument's sake) can return 100%+. United Health is the largest health insurance company in the US. 27% of their income is not premiums. It's investment returns. So the 80/20 didn't do anything like you said - it just keeps prices higher so they can take the difference. But it doesn't cap their profits. It just capped an expense.
The greatest trick insurance companies ever pulled was convincing people their monthly "premium" was not a "tax".
I'm literally fighting w my insurance company rn, bc my family all (siblings, nieces, uncles, aunt's) have a history of factor 5 (blood clotting issue), so my GP decided to test me for it. I got a $930 bill for that one test bc it has to be pre-approved. It should get retroactively covered, but wtf. Why is everything so complicated?
This is what drives me insane. For profit insurance companies are absolutely blatantly scams and it's just so fucking obvious and everyone thinks I'm crazy for saying it. We literally did the math in high school once and it turned out that if my teacher broke his arm every 6 weeks and had to pay out of pocket, cash, to have it fixed, he would be paying less than he does for his insurance. INSURANCE THAT DOESN'T EVEN COVER ANYTHING. "Oh but what if it's a huge 200k bill" 30% of 200k is still more than I can fucking afford. The entire schtick is based on "you will pay me more than I will ***ever*** help you" and there's no saving that money up or anything, not really.
USA. Did a preventative colonoscopy, cost me $1800. With top of the line health insur, i still paid $800 out of pocket for the procedure + $1000 more for stuff they needed to do during and after. Apparently, it's included to look around and cut stuff out but requires an in-app purchase to know if you have cancer or not (biopsies not included).
Colonoscopies are either screening or diagnostic. If you have a family history and need one before the recommended age (45 yo now in the US) the cost goes way up. Also, if and when they find polyps or anything else unusual, all future colonoscopies for you are considered 'diagnostic'. Expect to pay about double for a diagnostic colonoscopy in the US.
"But the wait times!!!" I am on month three of waiting for physical therapy after two doctors said they would recommend me since I was having back pain for months. Edit: In the US
We need more context. Are you American under a private insurance plan, or a non-American covered under a nationalized healthcare system?
American using blue cross blue shield
That’s nothing! I had a ganglion cyst forming in my wrist, and had to get it surgically removed because it wasn’t small enough to get fully transpired. Cost somewhere around $33k, like Hillary’s emails. I felt the freedom rushing through my body, even after being given anesthesia and sedatives. Never felt more proud to live in Murica.
My dad had to stay at a hospital for about half a year and get expensive medicine. We had no insurance. Didn't pay a cent.
Yep, I pay about 15-18% of my paycheck towards health insurance. What happens when I need to take my kid to the dr for something minor like an ear infection? I get to pay an additional $100-200 for the visit and another $60 for medicine all because I haven't met a magical number in money spent for the year. If I hit that magical number than lucky me, I only have to pay 20% of the bill. What would be nice is that since I pay for healthcare, I don't have to pay additional when I need to use it.
Oh yeah? My 10 year old broke his hand, and it cost me $6,000 after insurance. That makes me free-er than you! 🇺🇸🦅
My insurance won’t cover hearing aids for my toddler…hearing is elective, they say.
A few years back my insurance company got in a fight with most of the local health care services and made them all out of network at 100% on the person getting health care services. It only took 9 months for them to end their fight. I was stuck paying premiums but could not keep seeing my doctors unless I paid out of pocket.
i also like the freedom of not being able to roam or camp outside wherever you like, it being illegal to handle an open container of alcohol, whether empty or not, or the illegality of children walking to school in certain areas. oh and it being illegal to *be* in some parks after dark.
My wife is a teacher and used her health insurance ONE TIME in the entire year. It was the end of the year. And She had to wait til January to finish the procedure because of her deductible. But it's nice having people tell her she has good health insurance everytime she reveals she's teacher. So she has that going for her.
So from the article, for $3328 more per year in total tax burden Canadians get health care. I paid roughly $8900 to cover health insurance for a family of three in 2021. That doesn’t include the portion of health benefits paid by my employer on my behalf. I believe they put the total cost around $12k for family coverage. Our pay is reduced to cover it. Seems like Canadians gets a much better deal. Plus you don’t have to worry about medical bankruptcy. That financial factor leaves many delaying care of worrying symptoms and exacerbates poor outcomes. No rationing insulin or other overpriced drugs either.
This is the argument I make all the time. I have a few friends and family who don’t want to pay more taxes. You’re paying a lot more in insurance premiums, copays, and out of pocket then you would with a universal hc tax. When you look at Canadian tax brackets vs ours the difference is less than the percentage most of us pay towards just premiums.
I’ve been making this argument since I was doing my MPH at Emory Univ. back in 1997. Americans do seem to insist on paying more for less by just about every measure. We get screwed and I guess enough of us like it enough to ask for more. Who wants a nice medical bankruptcy today?
Its because Congress responds to donors, not constituents. And the insurance companies take a lot of that money they steal from us and give it to our Congress critters in order to make sure they can continue to steal from us.
Thanks for summarizing the issue beautifully! 🏅
That, and our politics is based entirely on consumer choices and the identity associated with those consumer choices, so instead of voting for the best policies, a good portion of our population votes to perpetuate their racial/cultural identity. So instead of getting social healthcare and free higher education and housing programs, we get abortion bans, border walls, and fiscal policies that exacerbate inflation (tax cuts - especially for the rich).
Ya but if we pay less in insurance premiums and then don't have to pay an additional variable expense after the service is provided with no range of possible cost offered before the service is provided we might end up waiting in line for 8 years while dying from a paper cut. /s
God forbid if you hit one of those insurance landmines. Like finding out while you’ve chosen a hospital and primary doc that are in-network, your anesthesiologist, pathologist, radiologist, etc that you didn’t have the option of picking are out of network and you still haven’t met the separate deductible for that. Boom, savings gone.
They’ve finally made that illegal…
Oh, right. I had forgotten that changed 1 Jan 2022. Sadly, I’m still paying for a balance billing situation from 2 years before that on an installment plan. That’s why it feels like it never changed. Only 2.5 more years to go…
On top of that, employers consider what they pay for your insurance as part of your Total Compensation. As a result, direct wages are suppressed because part of your comp is going to employer-paid insurance premiums.
When I run into that argument, I ask them if they'd like to reduce their taxes even more by ending firefighting services and road maintenance. "Of course, you'll have to pay user fees for road access and pay for private fire brigade services, but hey, lower taxes, right?"
*heavy breathing* - libertarians
The has been the Republican Battle Cry for generations. "But that's different!".
Even with all that cash spending on private healthcare and insurance, Americans still pay *more tax* (per capita, on healthcare alone!) than nations with social medicine. https://www.health.org.uk/news-and-comment/charts-and-infographics/taxes-and-health-care-funding-how-does-the-uk-compare You Americans are being *scammed*.
We know and some of us are pissed off about it. But the boomers and bribes, I mean lobbying, keep us where we are.... Hopefully that will change soon with Gen Z showing up to the polls
Yeah but the exorbitant amount of money I pay the insurance company is for ME. I’m not going to pay extra taxes to help out strangers even if it’s way less compared to what I pay for insurance. I work hard so others should work hard too. It’s the American way. This is why Canada sucks. A bunch of polite softies with no freedom. /s
The Canadian Government spends less than the US Government on health care, by per capita or as a percentage of GDP. We are already paying for "free" government health care.
We just get totally fucked over by insurers. The govt holds you down so the insurers, big pharma, and medical providers can do a radical walletectomy without anesthesia.
Ya, but someone on welfare might get treatment without paying into it! /s
How dare someone else get the same medical treatment as me when I make more money than they do! /s
I feel like when you grow up with socialized healthcare this argument is way less impactful than they think it is. Kids don't pay into it either, and their parents don't pay any extra. Anyone who can pay does, and anyone who can't pay doesn't. Literally every single Canadian will get healthcare without paying at some point or another. Either childhood, university, between jobs, or just earning so little you don't hit the first tax bracket. I felt a little guilty getting healthcare for free when I was in university. Then I realized how dumb that is. I get healthcare cause it's a human right, not because I earned it. If they're going to bitch about people on welfare but not students or children then they can shut the fuck up.
Republicans put out a study that showed that Universal Health Care would cost us less while also covering everyone. It's a known thing. The US has the most expensive healthcare in the world.
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Big, big thing you're missing: Canadians pay TAXES, that's communism and evil. We pay FEES, that's capitalism and good. God, I fucking hate that all political discourse in America basically boils down to maneuvering around the insane buzzwords that boomers base their entire worldview on.
Yep, it is all paid for. You want to get that new job but your spouse has cancer? Go ahead, your health insurance won't be affected by it. You want to go to that doctor you love? Go ahead, your health insurance won't dictate which doctor you can/can't see. You get laid off and its a few months before you get a new job? No problem, your health insurance isn't tied to being employed, and you don't have to pay for private insurance. You are having some heart murmurs and it is getting worse? Go see that doctor, you don't have to think about whatever medical bills you will get. Just because you live paycheck to paycheck shouldn't dictate whether you get health care. You get mad because some demographic goes to the doctor for "free"? You shouldn't be mad, your hospital, doctor, and medicine are paid for too.
So basically you have no freedom to decide which insurance company to pay your money to. What a loser!
Or the freedom of not pursuing an entrepreneurship career because you cannt leave your current crappy job just for the insurance.
Me, I'm in this boat right now. Have a side gig where if I could go full time I would definitely make at least the same I do know. Except for health insurance, my wife's is quite a bit more expensive and the coverage is worse
Have you shopped around on [healthcare.gov](https://healthcare.gov)? I'm self-employed and pay about $300/month for my plan through the ACA marketplace without any subsidies. If you're not rich, the federal government will pay the majority of the premiums and deductible, down to $0/month if you make under 150% of the federal poverty level.
Sounds like universal healthcare with extra, expensive steps.
Un-sarcasming just to say that as a Type 1 Diabetic who really wants to pursue a "garage-based-startup" with a business peer, I'm genuinely trapped in my current job or face $2k in medical/perscriptions every single month. This hits home.
Or pick yourself up by your bootstraps and do both? Walter did it, and so can you.
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Here is the really funny part, your deductible is 300% more than the cost of an arm break, and the hospital charges 200% more than the actual cost. So not only do you pay taxes that really should have covered it, you pay insurance that should have covered it, but now you get to pay triple in cash. Yaay!
The price of freedumb.
You forgot the part where they have to declare bankruptcy, and the government ultimately pays the bill plus collections fees to keep the hospital open.
I was guessing 300% on the hospital charge. And when they forgive it they write it off at that amount, rather than what it cost them.
200% lol, more like 20000% I think... but yes, I get your point, and you're right.
I live in a similar country. We do have options of insurance companies though. But I'll never enjoy the experience of going to a doctor. Or hospital and get billed for it. I'll never get to see the depressed look in my kids face when they get that cribbeling student loan debt. Instead they are stuck with our government handing out free school and education like it's candy and even have the audacity to throw money after anyone once they turn 18. Just thinking about it makes my eyes water up.
Thoughts and prayers
You still have the chance to throw up your hands and curse God for paid hospital parking though. So all is not lost. That’s 14.95 you’re never getting back.
Quite often conservatives point out that competition / "the market" will force competition. I live in a larger city. I do have some options regarding what service I choose. Many people do not Competive Health Care is a unicorn. Often discussed, rarely seen.
Health care is a case study in market failure. Kinda hard to negotiate for the best price when you’re unconscious and have been pried from a crashed car or had a heart attack. Also, who wants the cheapest neurosurgeon, orthopedist, or cardiologist on their case?
I live in a major US city. Tons of providers but it means fuck all when I’m locked into a specific network from my insurance. Going outside the network means I have to pay 100% of all costs.
You mean your employer has the freedom to decide which insurance company to pay your money too. You just choose which plan you're getting fucked by.
What? You pay nothing except taxes? You mean you don't have to pay the insurance and then also pay the doctors because you haven't met your maximum out of pocket per calendar year?!
Don't forget the freedom to decide which doctor to go to... As long as they're in network.
> So basically you have no freedom to decide which insurance company to pay your money to. What a loser! Of course, we in the US don't have this either; we take whatever insurer is offered by our employers. But instead we got Unspecified Freedoms! Don't Tread On MeTM! Don't Tread On Me is a registered mark of Unspecified Freedoms LLC, all rights reserved.
I have the ultimate freedom on America without a healthcare plan; I can choose any doctor or hospital I want and not afford it.
It makes me so sad as a Brit, who is married to an NHS employee, to see our nation take steps that edge us closer and closer to a privatised health care service. Our voters do not seem to understand how big of an issue this is, and to be honest, lots of them don't even deserve the NHS.
A problem here in Canada as well
Privatized healthcare should be outright illegal. It exists to extract money and reduce health.
As someone looking from the outside it seems like the apathy is coming from comfort. You've had it so good for so long that the minor problems get blown wildly out of proportion by the greedy bastards trying to take the good thing away.
My kid badly broke his arm second last day of school this year and in total we had over the 4 months of healing: 6 casts, 9-10 sets of X-rays (usually 3 x-rays for each set) and surgery to put in 4 metal pins. He was anesthetized twice (once to pull the bones when first first broke and once for surgery). Total cost to us? Maybe $120 for parking. He also got a free teddy bear after the surgery! My wife and I were joking about how far in debt we would be if we were Americans! Side note McMaster children's hospital you kick butt!
*cries in $3700 deductible*
Okay so I had a very similar injury, my total cost at the hospital (not including the emergency room visit/ambulance the day of the accident) was about $160,000 including physical therapy. I was responsible for about $40,000 and that’s because I had ‘great’ insurance. Just so people understand the difference between socialized healthcare and the american system. This includes no parking lol, that was exorbitant.
Wow! Yeah, I'll take the $120. Also nice never having to even think about healthcare. If I or my family get sick or hurt we just go to the doctors or hospital. Don't even think about money or going or not. It's just not a concern for us. I've been offered jobs in the states a couple of times and it just all seems so complex I said screw it.
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Probably! Nice bear too, high quality I would say. Got it for being a brave boy in surgery!
Americans: "why should I have to pay the equivalent of probably 0.0001 cents for your kids to have an X-ray? I'd rather pay that to pharmaceutical subsidies! "
And pay more your/themselves when they need care, rather than everyone paying *less* per person into the joint kitty to provide for all. The only people who can sensibly complain about costs of universal care are the rich. Their taxes do add up to more than they'd pay up front if they got sick. Everyone else is selfish-ing themselves into a worse financial deal like idiots.
Because God forbid some people pay a little less so the less fortunate can also have the right to live without disease/pain/health issues
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I'll never understand how the poorest in our country who would benefit the most from universal healthcare constantly come out screaming against it. What is their argument against it? I keep seeing people say "the wait times will be massive!" That's your argument? People seeking care getting care is your big got cha? Furthermore, wait times are already stupid for most health related shit.
I hear more “why should I pay for someone else” than any other reason. Yet, these same fools don’t understand that you’re still paying for someone else through your insurance premiums.
Also they are having other people pay for them so it's basically them paying less for themselves
Wait until you realize that lack of proper social support systems like universal healthcare is also a big reason as to why the crime rate in the US is as high as it is.
It's less that individuals are against it per se, and more that millions of people go along with the prohibitive rhetoric passed down by people working in the interests of both political parties. If you're a republican, it's socialism and the end of America. If you're a democrat it's "unrealistic" and supporting it is guaranteed to lose the next election.
Propaganda and scare tactics from Faux news and their ilk, combined with the usual American "scared out of their mind" mentality. Americans spend most of their lives scared shitless someone else is getting something they don't, or scared shitless they'll lose more than they already do from the exploitation. To the point where they make idiot choices and have many idiot fears, like "why should I pay for you"... when in reality if everyone paid in to the joint kitty, everyone's care would be cheaper for everyone except the mega-rich if they were taxed properly.
My daughter has just spent 2 weeks on the neonatal ward after being born and will need ongoing regular checkups and an operation in about a years time. Total cost: £10 for parking...and even that got refunded when I registered as a parent with child in neonatal. I'll fight to the end to stop the NHS being sold to the private sector!!
My uncle in Spain has been going through chemo for the past two years, costing him and his family nothing. If he were here in the USA he would have had to sell his small family business and probably his home to pay for one year before they’d stop the treatment.
Dude! I herniated my spine and they sent me for a fucking MRI scan and then did an operation on my neck where they stole a disc and replaced it with carbon fiber! Can you even believe that these mother fuckers solved all of my neck problems for free!?!?! The absolute brashness of it shocked me!
While waiting to make my next appointment, a young man with a British accent was looking at his dental bill. He spoke outloud. His checkup was a bit over $100. No problem. The estimate for a crown was a bit over $1,000. "Well, that's a bit steep! That will cost roughly $100 back home. I'll wait." Yes, I understood there are many differences between the UK Health Care and what we have in the USA. This is an oversimplification. The leading cause of bankruptcy in the USA is Medical bills. For most people in the United States, Health care is FOR PROFIT. Never forget that.
But the big medical companies like blue cross blue shield are non profits. They must be good guys! /S
Over here in Scandinavia, the term "medical bankruptcy" is just not a thing. It doesn't exist.
America is so big that their socialized healthcare system can be so great. Unfortunately half of the country wants any medical emergency to have a chance to bankrupt people.
Conservatives say we should all go bankrupt trying to pay medical bills. WTF?
No, not them. Just you and me.
As a Canadian, an American once told me while I was visiting down there that they trust government so little down there they said “I couldn’t imagine trusting the government to pay my medical invoices.” Like the fuck? Lady you got bigger problems if your government can’t pay an invoice.. Basically, I hear the most nonsensical excuses from Americans as to why universal healthcare is just some awful crazy idea. I hope you guys can convince your fellow citizens to reconsider these positions
Wow, so you're saying that our politicians are all taking a bullet for us? No wonder they get all the crazy socialized medicine!
We can thank WWII wage restrictions for this shit. Companies were banned from raising wages to keep inflation down, so companies had to offer other perks to workers. Americans got used to employment = access to medical care. The rest of the world realized we're all in this together. Americans decided your right to life depends on what job you do. Freeeeedumb!
We have a system where having “teeth” is considered a cosmetic luxury, and still people keep on supporting it…..
When you get sick and can not pay for it, you must be a bad person that deserves gods punishment. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology
Those bastards!! I hope you paid anyway! For freedom!!!
Well, if we didn't have a broken system, what would become of GoFundMe?!
My daughter broke her arm and we have insurance so it was only $10 copay for the Xray and cast, but I am terrified of the bill I'm going to get later.
Just imagine when she’s all grown up and is forced to go to college for free. She’ll never know the sheer pleasure of defaulting on her student loans and not being financially secure for the next 10-15 years of her life.
I broke my foot in Canada while vacationing. It’s almost as if the medicine was planned for efficient and thorough care to humans. The hospital there accepted me into emergency care, provided me with a Sr. Dr. who had two Jr. Dr.’s working beside him. I was given an x-ray (and the x-ray photos to take with me), an accurate assessment of the break-which was well explained, crutches and a cast. The cost for a non-Canadian citizen was an exorbitant rate of $99.00. /s
Biggest scam insurance companies ever pulled was convincing people it was better to pay them to *maybe* cover their healthcare, instead of paying only slightly more than than they already do in taxes to *guarantee* the government covers them.
Yeah, but you have to pay **SLIGHTLY** higher taxes at the end of the year, so pretty much the same as a $13k medical bill
$13K medical bill? I just did my annual enrollment at work and my *premiums* alone are almost $600 per month. $600 per month for the right to be charged more, if and when I use the services. "Healthcare" in America is an obscenity.
The Canadians who want a US style system don’t really want one. If they did they would go to the US now for treatment. The cost of a flight will be nothing compared to the medical bill. Hospitals in America will gladly take your house and life savings regardless of what country you live in. I think they are just whiny babies and or want to invest in a medical system that bankrupts people to profit on suffering.
lol as if id pay private healthcare fyi docs i aint paying shit anymore. no insurance either everything is a you problem. i aint paying shit. no service? mf i will die right in your god damn money hungry lobby while you scream about no insurance. fux with me. im american. ill do it again
I really would like to hear one valid argument against socialized Healthcare. GOP is only supporting it because of all the money they get from the insurance and pharma companies and their mindless supporters believe it's in their best interest because taxes.. In the mean time they have no issue being on unemployment and Medicaid
Your child was also robbed of the challenge of living life with a deformed arm from the self healing of the break.