121–130 of 381 posts
Just watched John Q (2002) last night, and can't believe that despite all the attention it gets, nothing has changed at all. Can't say I'm surprised though.
> Elizabeth Woodruff drained her retirement account and took on three jobs after she and her husband were sued for nearly $10,000 by the New York hospital where his infected leg was amputated. I'm not sure what sort of retirement they had planned to have on less than 10k, but it looks like in this case the hospital knew they could afford to pay but preferred not to. When people use number of jobs rather than hours wo…
> Elizabeth Woodruff drained her retirement account and took on three jobs after she and her husband were sued for nearly $10,000 by the New York hospital where his infected leg was amputated. I'm not sure what sort of retirement they had planned to have on less than 10k, but it looks like in this case the hospital knew they could afford to pay but preferred not to. When people use number of jobs rather than hours wo…
It could also be the companies aren't willing to have someone on full-time, because then they'd have to pay for medical and other benefits.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do all of the medical providers in other nations with universal healthcare have starving families?
The US doesn't have universal healthcare, so there's not a great mechanism for health care workers to earn a living without charging client for it. Some charities excepted.
Just because we don't currently have a functioning healthcare system doesn't mean we can't have one ever. As more people are made aware of how pervasive the issue is, there will be more impetus for those in power to start doing something about it.
> Elizabeth Woodruff drained her retirement account and took on three jobs after she and her husband were sued for nearly $10,000 by the New York hospital where his infected leg was amputated. I'm not sure what sort of retirement they had planned to have on less than 10k, but it looks like in this case the hospital knew they could afford to pay but preferred not to. When people use number of jobs rather than hours wo…
Are you asking why they couldn't afford 70% of an average salary (which, there is a 50% chance this person made less than the average) in one shot?
Your entire post seems to be victim blaming based on a few sentences of context. You don't know what other debts and obligations these people had, nor what other avenues they tried to exercise.
Also known as 100M people who may have died without medical care, but were provided it despite their inability to pay for it. If you remove the ability for medical workers to seek payment for their services, most medical workers are just gonna say fuck it and not work for free. Medical care providers have families they have to feed too.
The alternative isn't denying care. It is providing the same care without having people get into debt, which every other developed country (and a lot of undeveloped countries) in the world manages to do.
Also known as 100M people who may have died without medical care, but were provided it despite their inability to pay for it. If you remove the ability for medical workers to seek payment for their services, most medical workers are just gonna say fuck it and not work for free. Medical care providers have families they have to feed too.
The alternative isn't denying care. It is providing the same care without having people get into debt, which every other developed country (and a lot of undeveloped countries) in the world manages to do.
Interesting: > For many Americans, debt from medical or dental care may be relatively low. About a third owe less than $1,000, the KFF poll found. I wonder how they'd count me, who puts all expenses on a credit card and pays it off each month, technically I'm going into debt ...
You are assuming $1000 is easy to pay off. This is simply not true for the working poor.
Medical debt is a huge problem but to craft solutions we need to fully understand that problem. Should, for example, insurance companies collect "deductibles" ahead of time and refund those not used, similar to how you could use an HSA? Should healthcare providers and insurance companies be required to offer 0% financing for 12 months for certain amounts or certain customers?
The vast takeaway is usually "this survey supports what I think should be done" which often results in not much of anything being done, or getting something worse than what was before.
> Elizabeth Woodruff drained her retirement account and took on three jobs after she and her husband were sued for nearly $10,000 by the New York hospital where his infected leg was amputated. I'm not sure what sort of retirement they had planned to have on less than 10k, but it looks like in this case the hospital knew they could afford to pay but preferred not to. When people use number of jobs rather than hours wo…
> Why are they putting medical debt on credit cards?
Doesn't say they did - reads to me like they built up debt on the credit card with regular living expenses while servicing the medical debt.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The US doesn't have universal healthcare, so there's not a great mechanism for health care workers to earn a living without charging client for it. Some charities excepted.
The money going into medicare is enough to extend coverage to all americans provided the system is run with the cost efficiency of the typical EU healthcare system.