In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life • Hacker News Board

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#11

Post by evklein » Thu, May 01, 2025, 3:40 PM UTC

steamrolled wrote: post #2

I don't want to be judgmental because I know these are extremely difficult situations with no easy answers, but what strikes me about this article is that the author blames the profit motive after what can be uncharitably viewed as taking an elderly parent and paying a third party to make the "problem" go away from your life. This industry is driven solely by demand and there are highly-developed countries where it d…

> We're talking elderly folks we'd rather not care for ourselves and that we don't want to watch declining and dying, and we're dumping them into a large-scale... well, death facility.

This is pretty cynical. Not everyone puts their aging relative into a home because they want to make it someone else's problem. Taking care of elderly people is basically a full-time job. It's not easy to drop every other responsibility in your life (work, children) and focus on deathcare for someone else.

> there are highly-developed countries where it doesn't exist, or doesn't exist on this scale, simply because of different social norms and taboos

Are we sure this isn't because these countries regulate these industries in such a way that people actually want to work for these places and patients don't get gauged?

> What's the outcome we're hoping for?

The outcome is the same (death), but how you get here is what the central complaint is. Elderly people pay a shit ton and you don't even get the basic services agreed to by the other party - maybe if they're shelling out $11,000 a month they should be. Nursing homes have effectively become a scam, but they do not have to be.

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#12

Post by busterarm » Thu, May 01, 2025, 3:47 PM UTC

evklein wrote: post #11

steamrolled wrote: post #2

I don't want to be judgmental because I know these are extremely difficult situations with no easy answers, but what strikes me about this article is that the author blames the profit motive after what can be uncharitably viewed as taking an elderly parent and paying a third party to make the "problem" go away from your life. This industry is driven solely by demand and there are highly-developed countries where it d…

> We're talking elderly folks we'd rather not care for ourselves and that we don't want to watch declining and dying, and we're dumping them into a large-scale... well, death facility. This is pretty cynical. Not everyone puts their aging relative into a home because they want to make it someone else's problem. Taking care of elderly people is basically a full-time job. It's not easy to drop every other responsibilit…

Aye. I feel like I have it bad in my situation with one elderly parent...

I have a coworker with both his elderly parents and his wife's elderly parents. All four of them are deteriorating rapidly and need constant care and hospital visits. On top of that he has two sick, aging dogs.

We commiserate about the multiple full-time jobs that we have, but seriously he has it unfathomably worse than I do. I'm stressed to my limit and can't even imagine where he's at.

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#13

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 01, 2025, 3:54 PM UTC

steamrolled wrote: post #2

I don't want to be judgmental because I know these are extremely difficult situations with no easy answers, but what strikes me about this article is that the author blames the profit motive after what can be uncharitably viewed as taking an elderly parent and paying a third party to make the "problem" go away from your life. This industry is driven solely by demand and there are highly-developed countries where it d…

[deleted]

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#14

Post by legitster » Thu, May 01, 2025, 3:59 PM UTC

My grandmother recently transferred to a small, independent facility. For $10k a month she lives in a small house with a live-in caretaker and only two other patients. It's much more comfortable for her than the retirement community, but nobody can figure out why it's still so expensive.

The costs involved are mind-boggling. You'd think that $100k+ a year should basically buy you personal round-the-clock care in your own home. But either there are not enough people interested in the career or too many rules to make such a deal. (Heck, why can't she just pay her own children to take care of her?)

Baby boomers are just now starting to enter retirement homes and think about end-of-life care. It's bad enough now, but things are going to get so much worse.

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#15

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 01, 2025, 3:59 PM UTC

evklein wrote: post #11

steamrolled wrote: post #2

I don't want to be judgmental because I know these are extremely difficult situations with no easy answers, but what strikes me about this article is that the author blames the profit motive after what can be uncharitably viewed as taking an elderly parent and paying a third party to make the "problem" go away from your life. This industry is driven solely by demand and there are highly-developed countries where it d…

> We're talking elderly folks we'd rather not care for ourselves and that we don't want to watch declining and dying, and we're dumping them into a large-scale... well, death facility. This is pretty cynical. Not everyone puts their aging relative into a home because they want to make it someone else's problem. Taking care of elderly people is basically a full-time job. It's not easy to drop every other responsibilit…

[deleted]

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#16

Post by throwaway250501 » Thu, May 01, 2025, 4:02 PM UTC

Using a throwaway. Apologies.

My grandfather died of cancer before he was 75. I don’t know what it was, but the symptoms and his rapid decline were horrific.

My father died of multiple myeloma before he was 75. He was lucky not to suffer chemo, but from diagnosis to death took 14 months.

Now I have started observing the same symptoms which my father had at my age and have started planning ahead. I’m too cowardly to get a checkup.

But I’m not going to waste 90% of my retirement savings on cancer treatment, of all things. Would rather leave it for the next generation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sallekhana

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#17

Post by spacemadness » Thu, May 01, 2025, 4:03 PM UTC

steamrolled wrote: post #2

I don't want to be judgmental because I know these are extremely difficult situations with no easy answers, but what strikes me about this article is that the author blames the profit motive after what can be uncharitably viewed as taking an elderly parent and paying a third party to make the "problem" go away from your life. This industry is driven solely by demand and there are highly-developed countries where it d…

I guess the outcome we’re hoping for is to shame people for not finding the correct balance to keep their source of income in a cutthroat capitalist reality while taking care of aging parents who need constant supervision at the same time.

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#18

Post by legitster » Thu, May 01, 2025, 4:10 PM UTC

I have a flippant but not unserious suggestion:

I had a doctor friend who put it succinctly: "You want to die of heart failure. It's relatively painless, it's instant, and it's cheap. But heart disease is so easily preventable in a controlled environment that we can drag out lives much longer than they should be lived."

In a nursing home, they are obsessed with low fat, low sodium, heart-healthy diets. But you should consider a retirement of red meats and high activity.

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#19

Post by EA-3167 » Thu, May 01, 2025, 4:31 PM UTC

busterarm wrote: post #12

evklein wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We're talking elderly folks we'd rather not care for ourselves and that we don't want to watch declining and dying, and we're dumping them into a large-scale... well, death facility. This is pretty cynical. Not everyone puts their aging relative into a home because they want to make it someone else's problem. Taking care of elderly people is basically a full-time job. It's not easy to drop every other responsibilit…

Aye. I feel like I have it bad in my situation with one elderly parent... I have a coworker with both his elderly parents and his wife's elderly parents. All four of them are deteriorating rapidly and need constant care and hospital visits. On top of that he has two sick, aging dogs. We commiserate about the multiple full-time jobs that we have, but seriously he has it unfathomably worse than I do. I'm stressed to my…

I think this goes back to cultural expectations to some extent. In some cultures the response to that is, "Your parents probably had full-time jobs and then they raised you on top of it, and part of the cycle of life is 'paying that back' when they're old and sick." Granted smaller and more diffuse family units make that harder, but part of it is just the lack of a sense of filial debt to the people who bore and raised you.

Re: In the US, not even $11,000 a month can buy you dignity at the end of your life

#20

Post by EA-3167 » Thu, May 01, 2025, 4:34 PM UTC

pyrale wrote: post #8

pavlov wrote: post #6

This touches upon something that Europeans generally don’t understand about Americans’ individual wealth: the very last years of your life can drain almost any retirement account. I’ve often had the conversation with Finns who are envious of American 401k balances. But they fail to see the real value of a national pension system that is guaranteed to pay roughly 52% of your last salary for the rest of your life, and…

> This touches upon something that Europeans generally don’t understand about Americans’ individual wealth: the very last years of your life can drain almost any retirement account. This is also true in some parts Europe. Retirement home is very expensive, and the service is usually mediocre at best. There's also been the same kind of stories with some kindergartens lately. On many services, we're much better off tha…

Europe also seems to more readily accept "A cold snap killed off thousands of elderly people living alone", and that's doubly true in the UK. It tends not to get covered in the US because after all it's very local news and we already barely cover major world events, but if you pay attention to country-specific news it's surprisingly grim.

Maybe it was different before 2008, but since then in the age of "austerity" I wouldn't want to be old, sick, and alone in Europe.