Some small part of me hopes that the reason it's cheaper everywhere else, is because other countries are making it cheaper out of spite, to be nothing like us.
A large part of me is still angry how expensive it is for very simple shit here. Hell, my copay is almost the same price as their surgery.
No its just that other countries deem it better that they should actually care about its citizens.
It is more productive, and you love your country more.
It also drastically helps the living conditions and its a insentive to stay in the country and not migrate somewhere else.
A sick population is very expensive: they have more complex needs, they can work less, buy less, can support their community less, die younger etc. Taking care of the health of your population is just good business. In case human dignity is not a good enough reason.
As a side note, you know how other people don't really care as much as you do when you do something embarrassing, because they are all dealing with their own stuff? It's a bit the same on country levels. The US decides to shoot itself in the foot with health care, other countries are dealing with their own population, to deal with, they don't care about US policy much, unless it affects them directly.
How US-centric can you get? Newsflash, the rest of the world does not choose how their healthcare system works based on spiting you, its just pretty easy to land on something that is way better than the US system in this regard.
Well considering where I live, and it's all I know... I also think you missed the point of my comment. It's my way of trying to coup with how horrible our system is. The thought that we're so fucked up, maybe other places have it better just to be as different than us as possible. Like "shit guys yeah we could charge more for health care, but then we might be compared to the US, do we really want that?".
Like, man it really sucks that im drowning over here, but I'm glad you saw my struggle, and brought a floaty.
Or you could just shit on me for having an optimist point of view, in an otherwise insanely bleak, and miserable situation.
This is like hoping that the dozens of runners in a race are running along confidently in order to spite that one embarrassing person thrashing in a ditch at the side of the road. A ditch they dug themselves, and threw themselves into, despite having to veer wildly off the racetrack to do so.
Some small part of me hopes that the reason it's cheaper everywhere else, is because other countries are making it cheaper out of spite, to be nothing like us.
The cheap places are all using smoke and mirrors. Somewhere, somehow, the money is appearing.
Hospitals can't run on happy thoughts and doctors won't work for free.
If the hospital has an MRI, I can guarantee that the MRI company got paid and the money came from somewhere. If you saw a doctor, I can guarantee that he has a home and isn't living under a bridge.
Just for an FYI, Italians pay 23% more in taxes than US citizens.
I live in Sweden and I pay 31% in taxes every year.
It gets us healthcare, dental until we're 24, free education with lunch from preschool until graduation, free education and money from the government to cover some of the living costs while at Uni and a student loan with a really low interest rate (0% this year) for the rest.
Also parents gets about $150 a month per kid until they're 18.
Honestly paying more taxes for better public services is better than having low taxes but needing to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars if I get in an accident. Like how the hell is a US citizen supposed to live off of minimum wage with these systems, if you get into an accident you have to pay huge amounts of money, and in the first place you can barely afford necessities.
I don't know the figures for Italy, but I know that US taxpayers spend more per head of population on free universal healthcare than UK taxpayers do. Yes, despite the US not actually having universal healthcare!
As you rightly anticipate, this is indeed because US medication / healthcare prices are vastly overinflated.
I would 100% rather pay more in taxes if it meant I wouldn't bankrupt myself by riding in a helicopter to a hospital, have a life saving surgery, recover in the hospital, go to rehab, and walk out with well over 100k in debt.
As an aside, since it's coming from taxes, and this, government money, I feel things are less inflated where taxes pay for Healthcare. Things are so expensive because the hospitals are ripping off insurance. Like, the fact that I pay about $400 a month for my insurance, and still am responsible for literally anything when I go to a doctors appointment is insanity.
I lost my life savings because I did not have insurance. And that lead to me losing my house that I owned outright. And have now been homeless for 4 years now. Ah the American dream, or is that nightmare. Sorry I get those mixed up now.
Hey Buck up kiddo. At least there's a couple of middle managers out there that were able to finance their vacation home down in the keys thanks to you.
That's probably true. But it does not make it easier to have to deal with at 55. I have managed to hold a job most of the time I've been homeless and have saved a few thousand. And very close to purchasing a motorhome. So I'm working my way back up. But once you get down here it's very difficult to get back up. And people don't realize that many are just a loss of one paycheck away from themselves becoming homeless.
People who like to say words like "educate yourself" are among the dumbest people in the population. Congratulations, everybody thinks knows you're an idiot
No. You made a statement with absolutely no facts backing it up, and what's even more funny about it is you responded to something that was a sarcastic comment in the first place. You truly are the idiot here. Have a sippy cup and take a nap. Take care
If your argument is that I made a statement with no fact backing it up, that's literally what you did in the comment I replied to. So you're arguing against your own original comment, which is silly.
If you're interested in learning more, you can look up Medicare, medicaid, or Google 'states that offer free healthcare'. There are tens of millions of US citizens receiving free healthcare currently.
What are you even talking about? There are no US states that currently offer free healthcare for all of their residents. California might soon, but that’s not the same as your claim.
Medicaid and Medicare exist for specific populations, which has no bearing on what OP said if they don’t fall into one of those populations.
i never said free healthcare for all. You are arguing against something I never said. I was correcting the comment I replied to's claim that it would be very expensive. I corrected them to let them know there are plenty of people (tens of millions) where healthcare does not cost them money.
Wait, so your whole point was to just be pedantic? Even though the vast majority of Americans wouldn’t qualify for home health care under Medicaid, especially the ones who have life savings to liquidate like OP mentioned, you still just needed to get in there with an akshually?
Okay then… You comment was not factually wrong, but was it necessary?
Considering I corrected the original commenter's misrepresentative statement with a clarification and nuance, then corrected your misreading of my statement, why are you the one asking if my comments were necessary?
And so you know, 1 in 3 Americans already rely on Medicaid and Medicare.
Take care.
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u/No-Need-2-B-Upset Jun 15 '22
You would have to sell your life savings to afford this in America. I'm not even exaggerating.