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The cost of raising a child in America has soared (2018)

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Re: The cost of raising a child in America has soared (2018)

#101
post #75
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is frightening to read. How is this possible? My wife and I have 3 week old fraternal twin girls (wife is a living, breathing superwoman who carried them to full-term, despite being on strict bedrest from 26 weeks due to pre-term labor scare). We haven't gotten the bill yet but we had assumed that we were in the clear at this point because we've already reached the max (many, many months back, in fact).

You will probably get an insane bill. But don't get disheartened. Our plan had an out of pocket max and several different doctors (like anesthesiologists) tried to bill us directly because they were out of network. It took a lot of back and forth and many months but after all was said and done, we didn't pay a dime over the out of pocket maximum. This is apparently par for the course.

For posterity, we received our bill. My wife's antepartum stay (~3 weeks) was almost 2x the cost of the delivery. In total, the bill was just over $100k. Her out of pocket maximum, $3k, covered the entire pregnancy and delivery.

Re: The cost of raising a child in America has soared (2018)

#102

Most of this is totally optional. I have a dozen kids, and I'm sure not spending that kind of money per kid. Births are usually cheap. You can go it alone for $0 or get a midwife for $2000 to $6000. Most of us have health insurance with an out-of-pocket maximum. For example, mine tops out around $11,000. Crazy bills can usually be negotiated, with the hospital very aware that you might just not pay at all. Child care…

Stop having children. The world is overpopulated as it is
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