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The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

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Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#71

Post by randomdata »

noelwelsh wrote: post #22
womitt wrote: post #3

This happens when you give a lot of data to entities that helps others to empty your pocket...

That's not the root cause. It shouldn't be the case that you need such a massive loan for education or housing. The government has failed if it cannot control the cost of these basic items.

Assuming you are, like the article, referring to the USA, the only schooling that may necessitate a massive loan is post-secondary (as in after primary and secondary) schooling. The government has done a great job of controlling costs of schooling up to that point. It is confusing to me why you call that optional tertiary level of schooling a basic item? According to the OCED, only 48% of American adults have post-secondary attainment. The other 52%, a majority, seem to be managing without, living long and fulfilling lives.

It is understandable why you call housing a basic item. The small percentage without are often left to parish if the lack of shelter isn't quickly corrected. That is a real problem. But is any meaningful portion of the population actually taking out massive loans to make rent? In my experience, a massive loan is difficult to get even when you have a security to back it with. I am surprised that someone struggling to pay the rent each month has any collateral to put up against the loan.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#72

Post by codingdave »

jstanley wrote: post #2

> Google tells me that the most common reason for hospitalization in the US is childbirth. Thankfully, here in San Francisco, that would only set me back $15,000 Surely this is not true? Does having kids just bankrupt ordinary people in the US or what? I'm not asking about exceptional cases, like what is the normal way of dealing with having to pay $15,000 just to have a baby climb out of your body, when I'm assuming…

It doesn't bankrupt us, but it does cost money. Not really the childbirth itself... that is a one time cost, and it varies greatly with 15K being the high end. But food, housing, education, clothing, and everything else you provide kids, not the least of which is health care.... it all adds up. To about a quarter of a million over time, if you believe the analysts.

So with 3 kids, I'm likely $750K down on my wealth. As a tech worker, that is not bankrupt. But if I were living closer to poverty? Then the problem is less about my personal wealth and more about where I choose to cut corners when raising the kids.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#73

Post by stevekemp »

jstanley wrote: post #47
gutnor wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does healthcare insurance pay for that in the US ? In the EU, this is considered a personal life-choice procedure and very rarely handled by insurances - like cosmetic surgery. (being the EU though, you can get it for free using public healthcare)

I'm only familiar with the UK, but the NHS absolutely deals with births for "free".

We paid €200-300 in Finland, to receive a private room for mother, father, and baby for a few days post-birth.

I think we'd have been given a shared room for free, but at the time it seemed like a good choice to make.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#74

Post by arunmp »

I read a passage related to this, in a book called 5000 years of trade. Countries can be categorized as rich/scarce in capital, land or labour. Those countries that are rich in say capital, tend to enforce protections on capital while relaxing the policies for land and labour. So coming back to this article, I would say that US being rich in capital has strictly enforced and nurtured conditions on its society by which capital has decent return through investment into student, house debt etc., while meaningly deteriorating the conditions for labour (wages). This is the reason why it is incredibly difficult to become rich nowadays in US through wages alone..

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#75

Post by lotsofpulp »

chrisco255 wrote: post #57
jstanley wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So is that the normal case? The median birth results in the parents paying $3000? That still seems absurd. Do most people just decide to do it at home and take the risk?

No, normal case is your or your husband's insurance pays for it Deductibles can vary wildly depending on someone's insurance plan. However, there are a myriad of financing options, charities, etc if for some reason you can't afford that.

https://www.parents.com/pregnancy/considering-baby/financing...

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-06-26/sky-high-...

I would estimate the vast majority of people in the US need to budget at least $5k for a baby, if everything goes right. It would be better to have $10k cash though depending on prenatal visits, c section possibility, and multitude of other costs that can arise.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#76

Post by vinay427 »

gambiting wrote: post #12
chrisco255 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming you don't have healthcare insurance, which 90% of Americans do, it would set you back around $3000, according to: https://www.parents.com/pregnancy/considering-baby/financing...

But if I understand it correctly, for some unfathomable reason American health insurance policies usually have a deductible on them - so even if you are insured, you could still be paying few thousand dollars out of your pocket, no? That's insane.

Lots of insurance plans in other industries have deductibles in other countries, and the US certainly isn't unique in this respect. For example, deductibles are the norm in health insurance plans in Switzerland, which has a system not all that different from that in the US.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#77

Post by lotsofpulp »

Joeri wrote: post #62
blihp wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our medical costs are so out of control it's not funny. Many years ago (i.e. last century) you'd go to the doctor and either they'd treat you on the spot or possibly prescribe something for most common ailments. And if that didn't work, you'd go back and then they'd run some tests and/or send you to a specialist. Today you go to your doctor, who most likely refers you to a specialist, who orders tests from a lab (of…

Maybe the problem is insurance networks. This incentivizes doctors and hospitals to play by the rules of high-revenue / high-payout insurance providers, whose revenues are high because of those rules.

Not really, since people would switch to other health insurance providers who have lower premiums. The problem was not forcing everyone into the same insurance market.

Letting all the healthy white collar office people stick with their employer chosen health insurance means the leftovers are the poor and unhealthy which many insurance companies can’t handle the losses from since there is no health population to balance it out, so you have places that have no health insurance competition.

Even then, the people that make the most money in healthcare are the providers (doctors) and by a significant multiple, so increasing their supply would be necessary to bringing costs down.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#78

Post by lotsofpulp »

cowsandmilk wrote: post #13
jstanley wrote: post #2

> Google tells me that the most common reason for hospitalization in the US is childbirth. Thankfully, here in San Francisco, that would only set me back $15,000 Surely this is not true? Does having kids just bankrupt ordinary people in the US or what? I'm not asking about exceptional cases, like what is the normal way of dealing with having to pay $15,000 just to have a baby climb out of your body, when I'm assuming…

Health insurance will cover much of it, but more importantly Northern California is overpriced for medical procedures. Boston is $5,000 less and has equally good hospitals. And St. Louis is down at $6,000 and has really good hospitals as well. I had a friend who got an appendectomy at Stanford that was paid for by Google (she was on business travel, works in the London office) and the price was obscene, far above wha…

It’s not overpriced if there is no monopoly. No one is stopping other providers from moving to Northern California and stealing business by offering lower prices. If people want to live in a place with great weather, outdoors, food, and career opportunities, then they have to compete for it because lots of other people do too, and hence they have to compete to purchase things like homes and service from healthcare providers.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#79

Post by vishnugupta »

jstanley wrote: post #2

> Google tells me that the most common reason for hospitalization in the US is childbirth. Thankfully, here in San Francisco, that would only set me back $15,000 Surely this is not true? Does having kids just bankrupt ordinary people in the US or what? I'm not asking about exceptional cases, like what is the normal way of dealing with having to pay $15,000 just to have a baby climb out of your body, when I'm assuming…

Continuing that sentence...

> ...unless of course we needed a C-section, in which case it’ll be a casual $30,000.

In India, we got c-section done in a luxurious hospital in a suite ward for slightly over $1K. About 80% of that was covered by insurance. Even if it wasn't that kind of money is a typical middle class family in India can easily afford. Note that I'm talking about top of the line hospital so the median cost for a c-section is somewhere around $500.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm really blown away by that kind of cost difference. In a developed country shouldn't health be more affordable? No wonder medical tourism is on the rise in India.

Re: The Bermuda Triangle of Wealth

#80

Post by roenxi »

> But unlike the prophecies of talking cartoon bears, all this money didn’t drive inflation through the roof and crash the stock market. It doesn’t seem to have really gone…anywhere.

This essay is obviously backed by a lot of thought, but this specific conclusion is a bit glib. Talking of things which are exponential, 2 trillion dollars is a few magnitudes bigger than 2 million dollars. That is more than the annual GDP of most countries.

The banks havn't lost that money under the couch cushions, they will be using it to their advantage. If it is to their best advantage to have it in excess reserves, that probably means something complicated is happening that is letting them make out like bandits.

If they aren't using it to influence the wider economy, we really need to ask what exactly they are doing with it. It is an extraordinary claim that it "doesn't seem to have gone anywhere", implying that somehow it isn't doing something.

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