191–200 of 610 posts
You want to know what's outrageously expensive, yet equally important for basic ability to function in the workplace and other situations? Hearing aids. Hearing aids are glasses for your ears. But compared to them, glasses are unbelievably dirt cheap, and basically fully covered by a lot of decent company insurance plans. Hearing aids? Not the case. Imagine if glasses cost $2-3000 per lens. PER LENS. And your company…
You want to know what's outrageously expensive, yet equally important for basic ability to function in the workplace and other situations? Hearing aids. Hearing aids are glasses for your ears. But compared to them, glasses are unbelievably dirt cheap, and basically fully covered by a lot of decent company insurance plans. Hearing aids? Not the case. Imagine if glasses cost $2-3000 per lens. PER LENS. And your company…
Hearing aides are also insanely cheap to produce, they are not complicated devices and that market is only surviving due to the medical device status of them causing a high barrier to entry.
For those who are interested, The Amp Hour has a great episode with Jørgen Jakobsen who talks about his experience in the industry and its quirks.
https://theamphour.com/338-an-interview-with-jorgen-jakobsen...
Reminder, if you're in the US, the FTC says your eye doctor must give you your prescription after your exam. If a doctor refuses to do so, they can face legal action and penalties. https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2016/05/buying-prescriptio... That said, I don't think the FTC stipulates what information must appear on the prescription. Many docs leave off your PD (pupillary distance), which is a necessary measuremen…
It doesn't hurt to ask! The last time I got my eyes examined was at some cheap lenscrafters-type store which had a promotion for 2 pairs of glasses and an eye exam for ~$60. The PD wasn't on the prescription, but the doctor made the measurement after I asked about it. There was a very limited selection of glasses that were available for the 2-for-$60 promotion, and they really tried to upsell me to more expensive fra…
What I do is buy the frame with cheap lenses to check fit, then I buy it with nice lenses if I like it. They are so cheap there is no reason not to do it this way.
Even ordering multiples it ends up being inexpensive.
You want to know what's outrageously expensive, yet equally important for basic ability to function in the workplace and other situations? Hearing aids. Hearing aids are glasses for your ears. But compared to them, glasses are unbelievably dirt cheap, and basically fully covered by a lot of decent company insurance plans. Hearing aids? Not the case. Imagine if glasses cost $2-3000 per lens. PER LENS. And your company…
Reminder, if you're in the US, the FTC says your eye doctor must give you your prescription after your exam. If a doctor refuses to do so, they can face legal action and penalties. https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2016/05/buying-prescriptio... That said, I don't think the FTC stipulates what information must appear on the prescription. Many docs leave off your PD (pupillary distance), which is a necessary measuremen…
Zenni is very good. There is a slight difference in quality between them and the Armani Exchange glasses I got from an optician, but it's not significant. I got a basic pair of black framed rectangular nerd specs for $8 last week, and I'd happily wear them out. Measure the frame of a pair of glasses that looks good on your face and then try to find glasses with those measurements on Zenni.
I've been wearing glasses for over 25 years, the last 5 or so years I've been buying them from Zenni and it has been great. The best pair of glasses I've ever owned were about $25 from Zenni. I used to wear contacts a lot more until I got that one pair from Zenni. Now I wear contacts a few times a month. I had to get a new prescription, so I went to a Walmart. After, they said that they could replace the lenses in my…
I've converted several people, but not being able to touch them and try them on first appears to be a significant problem.
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Hearing aides are also insanely cheap to produce, they are not complicated devices and that market is only surviving due to the medical device status of them causing a high barrier to entry.
Decent hearing aides are quite expensive, complex devices with a substantial amount of R&D and non-trivial silicon. For those who are interested, The Amp Hour has a great episode with Jørgen Jakobsen who talks about his experience in the industry and its quirks. https://theamphour.com/338-an-interview-with-jorgen-jakobsen...
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I went to a local business a while back, where the optometrist was about 2-3 years away from retirement. I didn't want to offend them but politely and clearly stated that I would like to get my prescription. Still, they made a big act about parading me through their small collection of frames, and even suggested a few they thought I should try on. Just to humor them for a bit, I put on a pair and they made me look li…
The sad thing is that it appears that (in the US) for optomtrists, the eye exam is just a loss leader for the eye glass purchase in the "store" they also own. I assume my eye dr. went to college, medical school, and then some additional training (2 more years?). He does a very comprehensive eye exam, and my VSP insurance only pays him around $70 for the exam.
I believe the tear duct check is a loss leader. Most people have dry eyes (Meibomian Gland Dysfunctio) if you work in front of a computer all day. I have it and saw an actual ophthalmologist before so I knew all about it. It cost $$ so I was surprised the optometrist did it as part of the checkup. If you want to get your dry eyes fixed you have to 'melt' the clogged ducts and it cost $300 for the cheapest treatment. $900 for the one that works best (Lipiflow). The treatment isn't permanent so you gotta go back every year for the $300 treatment and every 3 for the $900.
Since the Costco optometrist can't make money from lens, I guess they make money from dry eye treatment. Also he gave me an option to dilate my pupils or he has a fancy imaging machine. The imagine machine costs $45...I opted for the imagine machine grin.
One last point - the Costco optometrist has a fancy digital goggles to check your vision. Another commenter posted that it's a waste of an education for an eye vision check. The goggles show the letters to read (it's not projected on a wall) and has lenses embedded within it. With a keystroke on the computer, it changes the lens. He really just asks "which ones looks better" and hits the keyboard. I was done in a minute.
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beware of cheap hearing aids, hearing loss is almost never uniform, so if they aren't adjusted properly they can be far too loud in the parts of the audio spectrum where hearing is less damaged, and can in fact cause further hearing loss. Not that this is any excuse for them costing $20,000, but its something to keep in mind, cheap abibaba ones likely just make all frequencies louder.
It seems like this could easily be solved by selling the hearing aids with a smartphone app to test your hearing and tune the aids, and a pair of flat frequency response headphones for testing.