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German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

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Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#171

Post by meroes »

ArmandGrillet wrote: post #37

Finally. Germany combines some of the worst aspects of the US (credit ranking, complicated abortion process, private healthcare if you want decent treatments) with the worst aspects of Europe (low digitalization, high taxation, recursive federalism: within the country and within the EU). A country like the Netherlands has its own issues (mainly housing) but doesn't have the myriad of pain points you can find in Germa…

400€ for medical, dental, and optical combined you mean. And less for students. And you conveniently leave out their 4 week minimum vacation time/year. (my sis and her BIL just moved from there, and help people move there).

Digitalization is really behind yes, and homeownership is even more expensive than the US. But rent is almost half the US and groceries are cheaper. And instead of subsidizing full sized pickup trucks and EVs, you get Audis, VWs, etc for cheaper.

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#172

Post by albert180 »

Ringz wrote: post #155
ArmandGrillet wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just open Doctolib and tell me it's the same when looking for any kind of doctor. The difference in waiting time is 3 months, bare minimum.

I just opened Doctolib and did a test with a dermatologist. The difference between private insurance was 23.5.2024 and public insurance 5.6.2024. That makes 13 days and not "3 months bare minimum". https://0x0.st/HnBZ.png https://0x0.st/HnBN.png

Also if your primary doctor determines that you need an urgent appointment, they can give you a priority code, which gives you a quick appointment, since those visits are paid on top of the regular budget for the specialist

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#173

Post by Nimitz14 »

mschuster91 wrote: post #122
formerly_proven wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High taxes with no matching value behind them is undeniably a negative.

> High taxes with no matching value behind them That is not the case for Germany. We have - even with all its shortcomings - a decent education system that's largely free and accessible for everyone, a decent healthcare system, a decent public transport system on local, regional and federal system, and a very decent social security network that covers unemployment, pension and elderly care. The US in contrast has nei…

Switzerland does everything better than Germany with far less taxes.

And since we're trading anecdotes I've found US Healthcare to be the best compared to the 3 european countries I've lived in before.

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#174

Post by sokols »

Nifty3929 wrote: post #160

People wouldn't be able to get this information without SCHUFA - at least not doing a fair bit of work. SCHUFA did work to build a system of gathering and providing this information in a consolidated way. I don't think people should have a right to demand this value be provided to them for free. If everybody now demands this information for free, why would this business continue to operate? And if they don't, how wil…

They are required by law to provide the information once a year, for free. The complaint here is that the “free” report contains less information than the paid one. Information which could affect a decision about a loan or maybe a decision of some landlord about a prospective tenant.

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#175

Post by albert180 »

greenavocado wrote: post #131
mschuster91 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> High taxes with no matching value behind them That is not the case for Germany. We have - even with all its shortcomings - a decent education system that's largely free and accessible for everyone, a decent healthcare system, a decent public transport system on local, regional and federal system, and a very decent social security network that covers unemployment, pension and elderly care. The US in contrast has nei…

INOVA in Northern Virginia charges $3000 for an uncomplicated vaginal birth. They have a code which rolls up many services into that code. There are additional in-hospital expenses such as the newborn hearing test which aggregate to about $400. If you have insurance your maximum cost out of pocket for the calendar year is between 5 and 15 thousand dollars (insurance covers everything above it). If you can't pay it al…

If Access to Health Care in the US is so great, why is infant mortality worse than in Cuba and they score dead last in every Health or Life Expectancy Metric among the G7?

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#176

Post by 261582335426158 »

Nextgrid wrote: post #113
formerly_proven wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High taxes with no matching value behind them is undeniably a negative.

Yes, that's my problem with high taxation, as someone who got burnt by it by virtue of living and paying taxes in the UK. I don't mind paying my fair share of tax if it means I get good value out of it, but the state of our healthcare here means that in practice the public healthcare system is no longer fit for purpose, so we are being forced to pay for a system that doesn't work and end up having to go private (and…

The key point to add is that (at least) 2 points must be true for this positive side of market to show:

1) There should be "forces" counterbalancing the move toward monopolies

2) It should be okay for the service to fail/die and/or it should degrade gracefully.

For example book publishing is a wonderful field that can gain from free market dynamics while prison management is a terrible field for free market dynamics.

While a dying publishing enterprise might print less books at a lower quality with deceptive marketing (and that is sorta okay) a dying prison management enterprise will squeeze every ounce of dignity/health/safety out of its wards.

Market dynamics for the economy are analogous to natural selection for evolution: both can produce wonderful things but they will require many more to die horribly.

This is not a statement against markets but I am calling for this tradeoff to be considered along with many other.

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#177

Post by lupusreal »

fabian2k wrote: post #71
panki27 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While choosing to be in the private system is an option, it only "makes sense" if you make at least 70k€ a year, so definitly not for everyone. The issue is not getting in - but getting back out before you retire and don't have enough available income to pay the rates anymore.

If you pay ~400 EUR for the public healthcare you make 70k or more. The cost for public healthcare is scaled by income, and is limited around 400 EUR. It's a bit higher now, but I would suspect that the OP is not necessarily talking about the most current values here and is hitting the older limit and therefore earning more than the "Beitragsbemessungsgrenze".

If you're paying 400 EUR for public healthcare, shouldn't you receive good healthcare for that? Why is private healthcare even in the discussion? Why does the public option suck?

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#178

Post by graemep »

Nextgrid wrote: post #113
formerly_proven wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High taxes with no matching value behind them is undeniably a negative.

Yes, that's my problem with high taxation, as someone who got burnt by it by virtue of living and paying taxes in the UK. I don't mind paying my fair share of tax if it means I get good value out of it, but the state of our healthcare here means that in practice the public healthcare system is no longer fit for purpose, so we are being forced to pay for a system that doesn't work and end up having to go private (and…

The UK tax system (like many others) is not as fair or progressive as it is presented to be.

1. NI means that the real standard rate on earned income is substantially higher than the "income tax" rate. it is also not fair that unearned income is exempt from it. 2. Lots of purchase taxes, which are disproportionately paid by people with moderate incomes. People on low incomes spend a higher proportion in necessities which are (rightly) subject to lower levels. The more money you have (beyond a certain point) the less you spend on things subject to these taxes. 3. Too many loopholes.

> so we are being forced to pay for a system that doesn't work and end up having to go private (and thus pay again) when we do need timely healthcare.

Some of the NHS is good. NHS dentists can be very hard to find and waiting lists are long. Waiting times can be long too. Reform is prevented by the fear of a US type system and I think many people think that is the only alternative (and seem not to realise how things operate in most other developed countries).

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#179

Post by graemep »

Nextgrid wrote: post #167
mathgradthrow wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

private enterprise is not "bound by competitive pressure". Companies only compete by virtue of the government forcing them to. Are you arguing that humans, inventors of civilization, are too stupid to figure out how to cooperate?

I disagree that companies only compete thanks to regulation. Companies competing is the default - regulation sometimes (either as an unintended oversight or malicious intent thanks to lobbying/corruption) prevents it though. There are many valid scenarios where competition is lacking, but generally speaking the reason it’s lacking is due to regulation/law making it impossible. Telecoms for example is impossible becau…

> Companies competing is the default

If you had no regulation, they would simply form cartels or merge to create a monopoly.

Re: German credit agency earns millions through unlawful customer manipulation

#180

Post by hocuspocus »

pjmlp wrote: post #162
hocuspocus wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Switzerland for a proper lease, you likely need to provide a (clean) record from the debt collection register. But it's a government run agency, as it should. No score. Debt collectors can file claims a bit too easily and there are errors, but you can also challenge them easily.

Back when I was actually living there, 2003 - 2004, it was only the painful interview process as if applying for a job, but I didn't had to provide anything else.

Debt collection records were definitely a thing 20 years ago.

But it sounds like you were dealing with an individual landlord, that's kinda rare. They might be more willing to use common sense and not ask useless documents from someone who just arrived in the country.

On the other hand, big property management companies will typically not bother with an application that doesn't tick all the boxes.

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