US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums • Hacker News Board

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#511

Post by JamesBarney » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 3:42 AM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #392

JamesBarney wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you have an incorrect understanding of pork barrel spending. Of that $10,000 that you put into the government. $6000 go to social security/medicare. $2,000 to military+veterans. Then another $600 to debt. And the remaining $1,400 goes to education/food+ agro/education/transportation/housing/science/energy/internal affairs. I don't know how much of that is pork barrel spending but I doubt it's more than a coup…

You're using national average math, not net-recipient state math. It's rarely the case that states that receive more than they pay do so as a result of social security. It would also be pretty hard for a state's net receipts to be interest on the debt absent some kind of sovereign wealth fund that held US treasuries, which most US states don't have. Moreover, the military budget is where a sizable chunk of the pork l…

But inefficiency can't get rid of $5,000 when less than that is left after simple transfers.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#512

Post by AnthonyMouse » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 6:05 AM UTC

JamesBarney wrote: post #511

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're using national average math, not net-recipient state math. It's rarely the case that states that receive more than they pay do so as a result of social security. It would also be pretty hard for a state's net receipts to be interest on the debt absent some kind of sovereign wealth fund that held US treasuries, which most US states don't have. Moreover, the military budget is where a sizable chunk of the pork l…

But inefficiency can't get rid of $5,000 when less than that is left after simple transfers.

Sure it can, when the "simple transfers" have qualifiers that induce unfunded inefficiency and other externalized costs.

If you have to spend five hours a month to prove that you qualify for a program that pays $80/month when your labor is worth $10/hour, you're not receiving net $80/month, you're receiving net $30/month and then getting paid to labor for five hours, the second of which you could have done for any other employer using the same five hours, so the value of the program is $30/month even though it costs $80/month to the taxpayer. Plus whatever administrative costs exist on the government's side. And then whatever value the alternative employer would have derived from having a worker available to work those extra hours.

It's even possible for programs to have negative value. They can cost money and then destroy more value than that. A lot of housing and other subsides can do this, e.g. you give some people $500/month for housing, but that only causes local rents to increase by $150/month -- on everyone, including the people not eligible for the subsidy. So on paper you have a thousand people receiving $500/month and you think you've gained $500,000, but then you account for the five thousand people who now pay $150/month more, cost of $750,000, and you're net -$250,000. Meanwhile the taxpayer still had to pay $500,000 to make that happen.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#513

Post by Vinnl » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 6:45 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #478

Vinnl wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not from the US and had to look up "inpatient" and "outpatient", so to share what I've found: as I understand it it's different ways of recording what a patient is suffering from, with "inpatient" being used when a cause is known, and "outpatient" when a doctor can only describe the symptoms, without knowing what they are caused by. And I guess the relevance is that discerning and switching between the two when a…

"Inpatient" means you've been admitted to the hospital. "Outpatient" means you're home the same day as your procedure.

Well, so much for my Google-fu. Thanks for the explanation.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#514

Post by JamesBarney » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 7:34 AM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #512

JamesBarney wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But inefficiency can't get rid of $5,000 when less than that is left after simple transfers.

Sure it can, when the "simple transfers" have qualifiers that induce unfunded inefficiency and other externalized costs. If you have to spend five hours a month to prove that you qualify for a program that pays $80/month when your labor is worth $10/hour, you're not receiving net $80/month, you're receiving net $30/month and then getting paid to labor for five hours, the second of which you could have done for any ot…

I know in theory you can spend money that destroys value. You don't even need to rely on weird supply/demand curves, you could just pay for bomber jets to literally firebomb a city.

But realistically how could Montana get an 80% increase in efficiency while providing similar services to the federal government?

And according to normal economics textbooks increasing market rent isn't destroying value. If more people move to a city which drives up demand and rent. Economists don't think of that as value destruction. In classic economics textbooks the value destruction caused by subsidized rent is that some people will spend $1000 on rent that they would never rent without the subsidy because they only get $800 of value from it + the dead weight loss of the taxes that funded that subsidy.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#515

Post by zrail » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 8:19 AM UTC

petronio wrote: post #489

zrail wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can keep it there and withdraw it after 65 penalty free (have to pay taxes like a traditional IRA) or you can pull it out now and pay taxes plus a 10% penalty.

Probably better to withdraw and eat the penalty then, inflation will make it worth peanuts by the time I'm 65.

Fidelity has an HSA with zero fees that lets you invest just like an IRA. I don’t know if you can open one without being a US resident, however.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#516

Post by dnautics » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 9:27 AM UTC

fucking_tragedy wrote: post #348

analog31 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somebody's gouging us. Who? Everybody cries poor and points the finger at everybody else. Nobody knows where the money is actually going.

> Somebody's gouging us. Who? Owners, executives and shareholders. Look at who owns the hospitals, practices, labs, insurers, suppliers and associated facilities.

that's not entirely true. There are nonprofit medical providers and they are equally expensive as for-profits; and there are also in the US a handful of "extreme for-profit" medical providers which are considerably cheaper (without sacrificing quality).

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#517

Post by dnautics » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 9:50 AM UTC

myhf wrote: post #366

dnautics wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private healthcare insurance has margins well below most profitable companies, in the us. If anything I'd hazard that the poor treatment of consumers by these entities stems from being barely able to hold the line, not because of greed. Rising medical costs, I think, have the blame elsewhere, but insurance companies sure do make a good Boogeyman for politicians, because they are very poorly understood.

> margins The profit margin is the amount by which revenue exceeds costs. It's circular reasoning to point out that an industry with enormous redundant costs has low margins.

I'm not sure you understand what circular reasoning is. And anyways, i can show you an industry with enormous redundant costs that also has high margins - hollywood - but of course they achieve that through clever use of corporate law; the median hollywood company loses money but the wins all go to the margins of the major holding companies.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#518

Post by ceejayoz » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 12:41 PM UTC

jnbiche wrote: post #510

Spooky23 wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hahaha. Sure. Good luck finding a Medicaid provider.

Every doctor I see is a Medicaid provider. Yes, there are doctor who don't accept it, but it's not hard where I'm from to find a doctor who does (perhaps we have an oversupply of doctors?).

"Medicaid provider" and "Medicaid provider taking new patients" are not the same thing. They'll usually set a maximum number of Medicaid patients for the practice, and there'll be a long waiting list for that.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#519

Post by geggam » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 4:20 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #342

geggam wrote: post #339

One thing he missed. Only in the US can you be bankrupted with full coverage, a simple medivac helicopter ride would take care of most Americans.

You can't be bankrupted with full coverage (except by the cost of premiums), but very few, proportionately, Americans have anything like full coverage.

you are simply wrong

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#520

Post by fucking_tragedy » Wed, Apr 10, 2019, 8:50 PM UTC

dnautics wrote: post #516

fucking_tragedy wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Somebody's gouging us. Who? Owners, executives and shareholders. Look at who owns the hospitals, practices, labs, insurers, suppliers and associated facilities.

that's not entirely true. There are nonprofit medical providers and they are equally expensive as for-profits; and there are also in the US a handful of "extreme for-profit" medical providers which are considerably cheaper (without sacrificing quality).

Non-profit doesn't mean "we don't pay our staff, partners and suppliers market rate". It's entirely possible that non-profits contribute towards rising medical costs through the same mechanisms that for-profit entities do.