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Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

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Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#201

Post by peteradio »

corrral wrote: post #179
peteradio wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how they consider my family who receives bogus bills that are being mishandled by insurance or the hospital or both.

2/3 childbirths we missed one (tiny, in both cases) medical bill and it ended up in collections. We were getting like 3-5 letters per provider per visit, and many visits resulted in bills from multiple providers. "NOT A BILL" (so why the fuck are you sending it to me?) same thing again from insurance for some reason, incorrect bills we had to fight, insurance refusing to pay on things they should so that drags out fo…

> not them being actual no-bullshit criminals

Thou shalt never assume malice so sayeth lord Hanlon (brought to you by Carl's jr.)

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#202

Post by oceanplexian »

jmyeet wrote: post #170

What depresses me the most about this situation is the callous, unempathetic disregard a significant portion of the population has for everyone not like them. "Just get a good paying job with health insurance" is not and should not be the basis for a health care policy. Americans are profoundly selfish and that's getting harder and harder to ignore. Many will defend such practices in the name of "freedom". "Freedom"…

> What depresses me the most about this situation is the callous, unempathetic disregard a significant portion of the population has for everyone not like them. "Just get a good paying job with health insurance" is not and should not be the basis for a health care policy.

The problem is this is a straw-man argument. We can agree that healthcare costs are too high, and have empathy for people who are being screwed over, but not agree that massive government intervention is a reasonable solution to the problem. In fact, there is an argument to be made that the only reason healthcare is expensive in the US is because of lawmakers failure to account for the second-order effects of their decisions (e.g. EMTALA). In the early 90s you could buy decent health insurance for less than the cost of Cable TV.

Unfortunately, the oft-repeated "solution" to the current crisis always involves forcibly taking tax dollars, and then directly funneling them into one of the most dysfunctional and corrupt institutions of all time (Healthcare), then lying to voters and telling them that doing so would magically turn the USA into Sweden or something. The people who don't support a public option are so exhausted making these arguments that they will tell you "It's socialism" and walk away from the conversation.

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#203

Post by paxys »

America has socialized healthcare with a hundred extra steps and implemented in the most inefficient way possible so that everyone comes out worse.

Hospitals aren't allowed to deny care (obviously). They will bill people outrageous amounts and know that they will only ever see a fraction of it. So prices for people who do pay are raised considerably to make up for it.

People don't get early preventive care due to costs or because they are uninsured.

Supply of doctors is artificially limited by the ABMS so that demand stays high.

The government doesn't negotiate or mandate prices, so drug manufacturers, equipment manufacturers, researchers, hospitals and everyone else in the ecosystem squeezes out as much profit as they can to make up for all the countries where they are not allowed to.

The end result is that the average American knowingly or unknowingly pays a lot more for healthcare than any other country in the world while receiving sub-par care.

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#204

Post by kube-system »

secabeen wrote: post #104
kube-system wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also intentionally go in to debt for any of my expenses subject to deductible, because my hospital offers zero-interest payment plans. I then pay their payment plan with a credit card, get 2% back, and pay it off at the end of the month.

This also ties into that commonly statistic that 60+% of bankruptcies are caused by medical bills. The study is more complicated than that, and it's not the best summary: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2009/jun/11/chris-dodd...

A lot of people read that statistic as "medical debt is crippling" but there are also correlations with lot of other life circumstances going on in that figure too.

Most of the people who file something like chapter 7 have little to no income, don't have big bank accounts, luxury cars, second homes, etc. This often correlates with people who have medical issues and rack up big bills, and can't work a job. These people can file "no-asset" chapter 7 cases, in which case, they lose absolutely nothing. This is what happens in the majority of chapter 7 cases filed. So, for a lot of the people who do choose to file, this is because it is a good option, not because it is a life crippling choice forced upon them.

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#205

Post by corrral »

peteradio wrote: post #201
corrral wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2/3 childbirths we missed one (tiny, in both cases) medical bill and it ended up in collections. We were getting like 3-5 letters per provider per visit, and many visits resulted in bills from multiple providers. "NOT A BILL" (so why the fuck are you sending it to me?) same thing again from insurance for some reason, incorrect bills we had to fight, insurance refusing to pay on things they should so that drags out fo…

> not them being actual no-bullshit criminals Thou shalt never assume malice so sayeth lord Hanlon (brought to you by Carl's jr.)

I truly don't think everyone involved could be making so many mistakes in their own favor if it weren't the result of policies tuned to ensure that happens.

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#206

Post by starik36 »

zikduruqe wrote: post #195

Not my family. We filed for bankruptcy, so screw the whole medical industry. Honestly, it wasn't bad and within 18 months bought a new car, new house and started life over again.

Doesn't the bankruptcy stick around on the credit report for 7 years?

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#207

Post by otikik »

yalogin wrote: post #161

None of these metrics will change the political stance our one majority party took. They have shut their eyes and ears and are hell bent on preserving the interests of the lobbying companies and fetishizing “free market competition”. I can bet a sizeable amount of money that nothing will change in the next 50yrs even. Today there is still a rule that a hospital cannot say no to a patient, I strongly believe that is o…

In the US, "free market" means that everyone is free to buy any politician they want.

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#208

Post by killjoywashere »

justinzollars wrote: post #140

I see any suggestion to the contrary of Socialized medicine being downvoted. Honest question. How do you propose to expand healthcare with 130% Debt to GDP and 8.9% inflation? It seems we are broke and there is a demand from the HN community to spend more? Feels like hitting the accelerator as one drives off a cliff and invokes memories of Thelma & Louise

"Socialized" explicitly means government ownership of the means of production (1-3). Weaker definitions include ideas like regulation, administration, or control. But let's stick with ownership. Your word, so let's work with that.

If the government owns the system, the government can establish all sorts of controls (4). What do you think the margin is in these sectors (% is of $3.5T in 2017)

Hospital care (33%)

Physician and clinical services (20%)

Retail drugs (10%)

Other health, residential personal care services (5%)

Nursing care facilities (5%)

Dental (4%)

Home health (3%)

Other professional services (3%)

Other non-durable medical products (2%)

Durable medical equipment (2%)

(1) https://www.britannica.com/topic/socialism

(2) https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/socialism

(3) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism

(4) https://www.cms.gov/research-statistics-data-and-systems/sta...

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#209

Post by avgDev »

killjoywashere wrote: post #148
asdffdsa wrote: post #142

I always figured that the reason why I make as much money as possible is so that I can pay for medical expenses when things go wrong.

Unless you make millions, it's unlikely your finances could survive an ICU admission.

Uncle was in ICU for 2 week before his death with multiple organ failure. His stay was more than $350k.

Basically the hospital took the house he worked his whole life for.

Re: Sick and struggling to pay, 100M people in the U.S. live with medical debt

#210

Post by stephen_g »

alephnan wrote: post #131
paxys wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> which every other developed country (and a lot of undeveloped countries) in the world manages to do. Where doctors also make much more modest salaries

Where? Not in my country, they do very well here in the public system…
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