Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

peoplespolicyproject.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 534 posts

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#111

Post by seanmcdirmid »

vonmoltke wrote: post #68
maxxxxx wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My family in Germany throws a fit when they have to pay 50 Euro for something. In the US you can happy if your cost for seeing a doctor is less than 4 digits.

> In the US you can happy if your cost for seeing a doctor is less than 4 digits. My wife and I have never paid four figures for a doctor visit, despite having two surgeries (one oral), a calf strain, and a dislocated shoulder (with ER visit) between us. The state of medical care in the US is bad enough as it is; you don't need to make up hyperbolic bullshit to make it seem worse.

A basic non-complication natural child birth will cost at least a couple of thousand out of pocket for most insurances.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#112

Post by shams93 »

jakobegger wrote: post #92
Someone1234 wrote: post #19

I moved to the US from a country with socialised medicine. When you include premiums then taxes in both were roughly similar if not a little higher in the US (ignoring cost of living differences). But even that doesn't include the real sting on the tail of US medicine. You pay a fairly high health insurance premium, but if you actually need health services you then pay again through the nose even with insurance "disc…

As a point of comparison, in Austria: - taking a kid to the ER costs nothing - taking a kid to a GP or a pediatrician costs nothing - staying a night at the hospital costs around 15€ - getting a prescription from the pharmacy costs 5€

Then there's education costs in the US, say you want your kid to go to CalArts, that's $50,000 a year just for tuition, so your kid gets out of school $500k in debt with a degree in performance art and a $3,000 a month student loan payment for life.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#113

Post by seba_dos1 »

vonmoltke wrote: post #53
titanomachy wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is the only place I know of where someone with good insurance coverage could expect to pay that much for a basic visit.

An emergency room is not a "basic visit".

I'd say that it applies even more to an emergency room.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#114

Post by AlexTWithBeard »

wirrbel wrote: post #79
vonmoltke wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An emergency room is not a "basic visit".

It is a basic visit. I attended a first-aid training for new parents here in my home country and the general advice was to seek help if in doubt, at night times by calling an ambulance or visiting, well, the emergency room. In two years we were there with our baby two times. Not charged a penny. During this time, I went once, my wife went once. In all instances we were reassured that it was appropriate to visit the h…

Interestingly, in the UK they had a large "this is not an emergency" campaign trying to make people to choose GPs over emergency services.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#115

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

titanomachy wrote: post #58
tathougies wrote: post #34

Individual US tax payers pay for most of the world's security. This is one tax of being the global super power, so it's not particularly surprising that when you include all things the US tax payer pays for privately that is taxed in other countries, you arrive at a number higher than other similar countries. In reality, there is no country with which we can fairly compare US tax rates.

I'm not convinced that US military intervention in the last 40 years has led to a net increase in global security. Although the existence of the US military probably helps. As long as they don't do anything. I'm undecided on this one.

Europe collectively twiddled their thumbs, "waiting for diplomacy to work" while Milosevic slaughtered Muslims. It took US initiative to step in and stop that.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#116

Post by btilly »

rootusrootus wrote: post #74
btilly wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it ironic that you stated the answer to your own question and didn't notice. That is, how notoriously terrible the government is at organization is a major reason for why people are against universal healthcare. Whether their concerns are overblown or not I leave to opinion. But that is a major fear for many.

I've always found it slightly amusing that the mostly unchallenged conventional wisdom is that private enterprise is more efficient and better organized that the government. Sometimes I wonder if the people who really believe that have ever worked for a large corporation. I also think people forget that, in any case, the gov't is not a private enterprise and efficiency is actually not their first mandate, it's effect…

You might find a more sophisticated version of that conventional wisdom to be less amusing and more worthy of food for thought.

It comes from Ronald Coase's theory about the natural size of companies. Companies exist at the tradeoff where the costs of transactions between multiple companies equal the internal inefficiency of a large organization. The larger the organization, the more it tends towards inefficiency. Anything that decreases transaction costs, decreases the size of organizations. And vice versa.

From that you expect large organizations of all kinds to be inefficient. Which fits your observation. Now note that government organizations tend to be are large organizations with a tendency towards complexity and no incentives for efficiency. How do you predict that will work out?

Again, whether or not this is a compelling argument is a matter of opinion. But if you want to understand the views of those who don't like government healthcare, this is a key point to keep in mind.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#117

Post by kelnos »

exodus_de wrote: post #88
maxxxxx wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My family in Germany throws a fit when they have to pay 50 Euro for something. In the US you can happy if your cost for seeing a doctor is less than 4 digits.

> My family in Germany throws a fit when they have to pay 50 Euro for something. Socialized insurance rates in Germany are 15% of income. Unless your family doesn't earn any money, they have been paying far more than 50 Euros. > In the US you can happy if your cost for seeing a doctor is less than 4 digits. That isn't generally true. Every insurance plan is different. Cheap plans have a high deductible. It's similar…

> Socialized insurance rates in Germany are 15% of income. Unless your family doesn't earn any money, they have been paying far more than 50 Euros.

And that's kinda the point of the parents' post, I think. If I were paying 15% of my income for socialized health care, I would be pissed if I ever had to pay anything out of pocket for my own medical needs.

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#118

Post by [deleted] »

exodus_de wrote: post #100
mikeash wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went to the ER thinking I was having a heart attack, and it turned out there was nothing wrong. The doctor who saw me afterwards thought it might have been intestinal spams. I got to pay $6,000 for that bit of entertainment.

Let me guess - your deductible is 6000$?

[deleted]

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#119

Post by icebraining »

throw2016 wrote: post #83
tathougies wrote: post #34

Individual US tax payers pay for most of the world's security. This is one tax of being the global super power, so it's not particularly surprising that when you include all things the US tax payer pays for privately that is taxed in other countries, you arrive at a number higher than other similar countries. In reality, there is no country with which we can fairly compare US tax rates.

This can't be right. The bulk of US defense expenses in the last 2 decades for instance have been in needless middle east wars that destroyed those countries, killed millions and enriched US corporations and their employees. It created power vacuums and destabilized entire regions that allowed the rise of ISIS and other extremist groups. There is now slave trade in Libya which was one of the most advanced countries i…

Sounds familiar

"They have pillaged the world: when the land has nothing left for men who ravage everything, they scour the sea. If an enemy is rich, they are greedy, if he is poor, they crave glory. Neither East nor West can sate their appetite. They are the only people on earth to covet wealth and poverty with equal craving. They plunder, they butcher, they ravish, and call it by the lying name of 'empire'. They make a desolation and call it 'peace'."

Re: US Workers Are Highly Taxed If You Count Premiums

#120

Post by the_mitsuhiko »

jakobegger wrote: post #92
Someone1234 wrote: post #19

I moved to the US from a country with socialised medicine. When you include premiums then taxes in both were roughly similar if not a little higher in the US (ignoring cost of living differences). But even that doesn't include the real sting on the tail of US medicine. You pay a fairly high health insurance premium, but if you actually need health services you then pay again through the nose even with insurance "disc…

As a point of comparison, in Austria: - taking a kid to the ER costs nothing - taking a kid to a GP or a pediatrician costs nothing - staying a night at the hospital costs around 15€ - getting a prescription from the pharmacy costs 5€

And if the insurance does not cover something the prices are reasonable and transparent.
Post reply on HN