121–130 of 534 posts
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Taking a kid with fever to the ER is about as basic as you get.
Doesn't the US have out-of-hours pharmacies, or out of hours doctors, or urgent but not emergency treatment centres?
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Taking a kid with fever to the ER is about as basic as you get.
Doesn't the US have out-of-hours pharmacies, or out of hours doctors, or urgent but not emergency treatment centres?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I fell down the stairs and had a muscle spasm in my back. Had to go an ER. I had insurance that was considered good and it still cost me $350 for 10 minutes with the doctor and a bottle of muscle relaxers.
An ER visit is not the same as a simple doctor's visit. If ER visits are necessary (questionable in this case), they are covered by insurance - by law. Your deductible still applies.
Like to bring this up when we talk taxes: I think it's totally crazy that we give the feds 25% or more and our states soo soo sooooo much less. I think it should be the other way around: 5% for the feds, and maybe 20% to the states. The reason is that our cities are filled with bums, and have absolutely no money to either give them jobs or make new programs. The feds don't give a shit and are busy making missiles or…
New York City spends about $30k per homeless and you still cannot walk a block without seeing one.
It's not about the money...
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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…
1. The 15% of income has a cap. It's something like after 60k EUR in wages you don't pay anymore. Also, only 7.5% comes out of your paycheck, the employer pays the other half. When I was there a few years ago I was self employed so I had to pay "both sides". It would've worked out to roughly 750EUR/month for health insurance which had _0 deductible_ and _0 coinsurance_ for doctors visits or ER care and would've covered my entire family no matter on my children I had. Compare that with a typical HDHP family plan offered in the US and you're looking at $400/mo in premiums, with a $3k deductible and max OOP of $6k. The final cost is comparable.
2. The 15% is only if you participate in the public system - the private is not tied to your income.
We certainly do seem to pay far too much for health care! But the explanations aren't as simple as evil health insurers. The system appears to be structurally pretty messed up, and alterations to the payer-side alone, without radical changes to the provider side, are unlikely to solve the problem.
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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€
Yeah, and cost of health insurance in Austria is just 7,65% of your income, and it covers your children. When I've worked in the US, I've paid just as much for health insurance and still had high out-of-pockets and deductibles on top of that.
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You might have a skewed sense of what median Canadian income is. And your job might be further above that median than you realize. Median Canadian individual income is ~$35,000 [0]. In B.C., your average 2019 tax rate would be 13.34% not including non-refundable tax credits (and so the effective rate would likely be a point or two lower). [1] A median tax rate of 11.5% against a median Canadian individual income seem…
It seems you're right. I know I was close to the average for my region, but that's a high cost-of-living city with a much higher median income than 35k. I may have also been conflating household and individual income. Lessons: 1) I have no concept of the median experience in my country, 2) a single number can't answer the question "does this country have high taxes".
I spent my 20s far below median (which I knew), and my 30s far above median (which I didn't realize, at least not at first). Very different lived experiences :)
And I know many folks around me (friends, family, colleagues) look around (confirmation bias & availability heuristic, amongst others) and believe that $60k-$80k (or more) represents a "typical" lived Canadian experience. They are, to a person, universally surprised to see the actual median income (as was I when first tracking it down).
It certainly is viewpoint-shifting. Cheers!
This does not take into account the fact that in most countries with an universal health care system, you will only contribute to it during your +/- 40 years career while you'll benefit from it during your whole life.
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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€
Yeah, and cost of health insurance in Austria is just 7,65% of your income, and it covers your children. When I've worked in the US, I've paid just as much for health insurance and still had high out-of-pockets and deductibles on top of that.
The US is much cheaper for all health insurances, except if your poor. Obama tried to fix that, but made it worse and more expensive for everyone (socialism).