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The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

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Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#61

Post by dagw »

jstanley wrote: post #47
gutnor wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does healthcare insurance pay for that in the US ? In the EU, this is considered a personal life-choice procedure and very rarely handled by insurances - like cosmetic surgery. (being the EU though, you can get it for free using public healthcare)

I'm only familiar with the UK, but the NHS absolutely deals with births for "free".

Sure, but if you for some reason don't want to give birth at an NHS hospital then your health insurance probably won't cover the costs of a private hospital.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#62

Post by Joeri »

blihp wrote: post #24
jstanley wrote: post #2

> Google tells me that the most common reason for hospitalization in the US is childbirth. Thankfully, here in San Francisco, that would only set me back $15,000 Surely this is not true? Does having kids just bankrupt ordinary people in the US or what? I'm not asking about exceptional cases, like what is the normal way of dealing with having to pay $15,000 just to have a baby climb out of your body, when I'm assuming…

Our medical costs are so out of control it's not funny. Many years ago (i.e. last century) you'd go to the doctor and either they'd treat you on the spot or possibly prescribe something for most common ailments. And if that didn't work, you'd go back and then they'd run some tests and/or send you to a specialist. Today you go to your doctor, who most likely refers you to a specialist, who orders tests from a lab (of…

Maybe the problem is insurance networks. This incentivizes doctors and hospitals to play by the rules of high-revenue / high-payout insurance providers, whose revenues are high because of those rules.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#63

Post by pjc50 »

TomMarius wrote: post #5
jstanley wrote: post #2

> Google tells me that the most common reason for hospitalization in the US is childbirth. Thankfully, here in San Francisco, that would only set me back $15,000 Surely this is not true? Does having kids just bankrupt ordinary people in the US or what? I'm not asking about exceptional cases, like what is the normal way of dealing with having to pay $15,000 just to have a baby climb out of your body, when I'm assuming…

It costs around the same in Europe if you don't have insurance. I'm pretty sure it's the same in the USA - this is the rate that would be charged to your insurance company. Rates are way lower for uninsured people if you ask them and tell them that you're not insured (I got a bill lowered 10 times when I broke my hand); and of course most people have some kind of insurance. To the people downvoting: please read prope…

I think it would have helped if you specified Czech rather than "Europe", because it's a big place and it looks like many of the smaller countries have this kind of non-public system. The rules appear to be complicated: https://www.kancelarzp.cz/en/links-info-en/health-insurance-...

It sounds like there's a hole for people to fall in: if you're a Czech national, but not resident nor employed in Czech Republic, but in the country anyway, and you don't have private insurance, then you have a problem.

(It looks like if you're a resident proper in another EU country with resident-based healthcare, such as the UK, then that would work for EHIC purposes if you visited Czech Republic.)

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#64

Post by expertentipp »

gambiting wrote: post #42
TomMarius wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is absolutely not true. I am a citizen of the Czech Republic and if I stop being insured, e.g. because of changing my place of permanent residence, I'm not entitled to anything .

Then Czech Republic must be an exception in the EU - pretty much every other country that I lived in worked on the simple principle of "you are a citizen/resident = you are entitled to care". Even if you didn't make any payments ever(due to lack of a job, or being homeless or disabled for example) you would still be 100% covered.

Not the case for Poland either. If one is not employed and not registered as unemployed (authorities are doing all they can to keep the official unemployment statistics low), one has to proactively subscribe to "voluntary health insurance". In case one doesn't - pronto! one has no healthcare insurance. Of course, the constitution guarantees the healthcare, free-universal-healthcare blah blah - good luck suing everyone or anyone while being in such life situation.

Slightly different, but also extreme, case - Germany. There, one always is insured, only for the months one doesn't pay a debt is accumulating (you thought healthcare can incur debt only in US?). It's quite difficult to get out of German healthcare insurance actually, even while being EU citizen and moving out of Germany.

In fact, for a EU citizen who takes advantage of free movement of workers and relocates often between EU countries, one can fall pretty badly on its face healthcare insurance-wise.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#65

Post by gambiting »

NiekvdMaas wrote: post #53
TomMarius wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is absolutely not true. I am a citizen of the Czech Republic and if I stop being insured, e.g. because of changing my place of permanent residence, I'm not entitled to anything .

Incorrect. For example in The Netherlands it is mandatory to be insured. If you refuse to pay insurance, not only will you have to pay 100% of healthcare costs, you'll also be fined.

Yes, except that if you are not in a position to pay(make below X/year, are disabled, homeless etc etc) you don't pay anything. You have to have insurance, but depending on the circumstances you might not have to pay for it.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#66

Post by SmallDeadGuy »

berberous wrote: post #48
nelsonic wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a reason for the saying: "The Rich get Richer and the Poor get Children". Perversely having children is a "luxury" many people simply cannot afford. The happiness a "bundle of joy" should bring to the family is often replaced by additional stress of having to work a "better paying" (but often soul-destroying) job to be able to afford the bigger house, school/education, extra curricular activities like sports/…

Apologies if this unsolicited advice comes off as rude, but consider easing up on the italicizing and "quoting" of random words. It makes your writing style hard to read and waters down the effect when you do each once per paragraph.

I completely agree. To me, 9 formatting changes in a single sentence, e.g. in the second sentence of that GitHub repo readme, is incredibly excessive. While the comment you replied to isn't nearly as extreme, it still has a similar issue of too many formatting changes per paragraph.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#67

Post by dagw »

cronz wrote: post #11
TomMarius wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It costs around the same in Europe if you don't have insurance. I'm pretty sure it's the same in the USA - this is the rate that would be charged to your insurance company. Rates are way lower for uninsured people if you ask them and tell them that you're not insured (I got a bill lowered 10 times when I broke my hand); and of course most people have some kind of insurance. To the people downvoting: please read prope…

Haha, what? Childbirth costs 0 € in a public hospital

Technically in Sweden it costs ~10€ pr. night.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#68

Post by vermilingua »

I've been wondering recently if the economy has shaped to optimally exploit the most readily available and easily renewable resource available: people.

There's been an explosion in computing power over the last two decades, and computing power roughly equals the ability to optimise. Has this allowed the economy, through sheer market forces, to reach an equilibrium where people are maximally exploited while still being able to grow, and increase their "value output" over time?

Has the economy managed to dodge the malthusian trap with humanity, that it has otherwise fallen into with fossil fuels and rare metals/minerals?

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#69

Post by raarts »

TomMarius wrote: post #5
jstanley wrote: post #2

> Google tells me that the most common reason for hospitalization in the US is childbirth. Thankfully, here in San Francisco, that would only set me back $15,000 Surely this is not true? Does having kids just bankrupt ordinary people in the US or what? I'm not asking about exceptional cases, like what is the normal way of dealing with having to pay $15,000 just to have a baby climb out of your body, when I'm assuming…

It costs around the same in Europe if you don't have insurance. I'm pretty sure it's the same in the USA - this is the rate that would be charged to your insurance company. Rates are way lower for uninsured people if you ask them and tell them that you're not insured (I got a bill lowered 10 times when I broke my hand); and of course most people have some kind of insurance. To the people downvoting: please read prope…

Virtually all of Europe has either publicly sponsored and regulated universal health care or publicly provided universal healthcare.[1]

So if an EU citizen moves to another EU country, there's no problem.

An average hospital in The Netherlands (#1 in quality in Europe [2], but #6 in costs) charges the insurance company between €607 (natural birth) and €4450 (c-section).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_with_univers...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Europe#European_...

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#70

Post by maeln »

gutnor wrote: post #43
chrisco255 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming you don't have healthcare insurance, which 90% of Americans do, it would set you back around $3000, according to: https://www.parents.com/pregnancy/considering-baby/financing...

Does healthcare insurance pay for that in the US ? In the EU, this is considered a personal life-choice procedure and very rarely handled by insurances - like cosmetic surgery. (being the EU though, you can get it for free using public healthcare)

It's not the case in most EU country I visited. In France, giving birth is 100% free, even if you have to go to a private clinic/hospital.
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