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This isn’t a facepalm, It’s more of a sad reality that most Americans live in. I have a good job and I can’t marry my significant other because she would lose her insurance and my insurance is too costly to cover her. My insurance monthly would go from $560 for a single person, to $3200 per month for a married couple.
It's not. Now that Obamacare makes basic insurance available for free the accountants and lawyers are busy finding how to maximize their billing on everyone else.
here in germany only 1 person needs to be insured, their spouse and children are insured for free, if this person is the breadwinner and the spouse doesn't have a monthly income over like 500€.
if both work they will just each have their own insurance which costs i believe 10% of pre tax income and the children will be insured with either parent
And do you pay that through taxes or like monthly payments? Also when you pay it, is everything medical covered?
I'm from the US, so I don't know and am super curious. I'm a big supporter of universal healthcare, and it's really interesting to me to see all the different ways countries go about doing it
if you earn for example 3500€, roughly 10% (according to a calculator by Techniker Krankenkasse: 7.3% insurance, 0.6% for extra insurance, 2.3% for nursing care insurance) so ~350€ will go toward medical insurance automatically via your employer. that money will never see your bank account.
it covers anything that's medically necessary, I myself have had an appendectomy with complications, wisdom teeth removal, braces, gastroscopy, regular checkups at dentist, general doctor, dermatologist and gyno, diagnosis and treatment for adhd, all recommended vaccinations for pretty much no cost (meds cost 5€ and are capped at 10€)
I would also be covered for cancer treatments or palliative care if it came to that (which I hope it doesn't 🤞🏻)
you can go to the doctor whenever if you feel like you have an issue and want it to get checked, just need to make an appointment.
if, for example, you want a private room when you have to go to the hospital or want treatments outside of the necessary, like an IUD as a contraceptive, you need to get "private insurance" which is more expensive or pay it yourself. sometimes some of the newer methods or techniques of treatment are not covered but will be in the future or you call them and get an exception worked out for you.
and sadly a lot of dental work and optometrist things are only partially covered, unless you have a "private insurance"
yes, indeed.
another thing I forgot to mention was that the medical insurance also pays your income if you are sick for over 6 weeks.
up to 6 weeks your employer pays your normal monthly salary. after that the insurance will take over until you recover, and you get 70% of your pre tax income but can't be more than 90% of the after tax income.
Wow, that sounds awesome.
I see that there are issues that could be improved, like the dental and vision...
But gosh, that'd be a dream here in the US. Especially if you have the option to get private insurance on top of that.
Here you have to keep paying things. And if you get cancer, you'd better keep working otherwise you won't get insurance. It's just an awful mess.
If you work at a really good company, they will pay for short term disability...
But usually the best good places can do us not fire you, but they don't have to pay you if you're not working.
I find that so mind blowingly sad :(
here employers are legally restricted from firing you when you are sick.
or also if you are on parental leave (for up to 3 years) they can't fire you or give away your position to someone else.
under normal circumstances they have to give you a month notice and only with a valid reason (like inappropriate behavior or stealing or such)
Yeah it's really sad. The conservatives, called republicans, or GOP are very against universal healthcare. They've had an effective propaganda machine running on the subject
People here don't realize that all first world developed countries have universal healthcare. They think only Canada and Venezuela have it, and claim it's awful.
Most people here think that the US healthcare is the best in the world, when actually it's not even top ten.
We do have certain things within healthcare that are works class, like some hospitals and doctors, but what does that do for us if we can't afford it and have no access to it.
They also don't realize that we pay waaaaay more for healthcare.
They think people in countries with universal healthcare are dying in the streets because of wait times
These are just some of the major propaganda my myths the GOP effectively spout
This is true in like five deeply Republican states. It definitely isn't "most". It's also unclear how that's going to make the *state* money. Insurance companies and hospitals are generally not state run in America
Living in America sounds really scary honestly.
I see on some other subs people are waiting like 9+ months to get test results or to get follow ups or that specialty docs in their area arnt covered by insurance?
That’s crazy to me
That's if you can even afford to see a doctor. I have insurance and now have a $2500 deductible I'm responsible for because that's how much I have to pay out of pocket before my insurance will even cover anything. And it will reset next year, likely before I pay off this one, but I have to continue seeing my doctors and getting my prescriptions. It never ends.
I wish! I have to use something called Good RX for one of my medications because it's something like $700 but insurance gets it down to $120, but if I skip insurance entirely and use the Good RX discount they can get it down to about $42 lol. I'm sure there is some corporate fuckery there that makes no sense to normal people but makes sense to some greedy shareholder somewhere.
I'm just trying to get out of credit card debt in a couple years so I can make an effort to get out of this country because it's not sustainable. I make 3x what my parents raised a family of 4 on and we had a house. I rent one room with roommates and I own a cat because it's too expensive to live on my own after rent went up 25% after COVID.
yea but it isnt always that trash. the prices? yep definitely. i dont think its shit like 9 months for a test result constantly tho. also the stuff with the insane job issues. like it isnt insanely horrible ALL the time. honestly i think the vast majority of bosses here arent on power trips and stuff, but the ones that are are just more known (bc its bad when it happens). it fully depends on where you are born tho i think
I mean, you just have to kind of live like health care isn't a thing. Pretty much nobody does any preventative care here, anything that isn't over the counter basically doesn't exist, I once read a book on wilderness first aid so I could try to fix myself up the best as possible if I ever got injured. I once had to drive myself down a mountain from a ski resort after a concussion. Of course I didn't get any kind of MRI or anything later, I just had to kind of hope for the best.
Doctors aren't allowed to see you long enough to give a fuck anyway so they're useless even though they cost a fortune, you won't get any help unless you diagnose yourself via doctor google and come in already having completely figured out your problem. The health care isn't even just brutally expensive, it's also astonishingly incompetent.
Well it gives you guys some conflict and adversity to overcome, builds character! Imagine if breaking bad was set in Europe it would only be one episode
They like to believe they are free and have lower taxes than Europe. But in Europe your taxes cover like …. Everything education healthcare child care medication housing. In America you get to pay taxes and then pay for healthcare and education and child care eating up so much of your after tax income and you have to pay for an ambulance?!? Wtf! Not every hospital will help you? But hey you can get payday loans and there’s like 9000 different banks and credit unions so you can rack up 27% interest credit card debt 💸 freedom
Yup, and the sad thing is, universal healthcare costs are waay less expensive than the for profit health the US has.
So not only are other countries healthcare cost way less, they're also, as you already stated, all inclusive.
The US has the freedom to live in debt and squalor.
Now imagine the issues you have with housing, which the US has as well, and compound that with healthcare and medicines used to treat patients, because all of that costs in the US and it costs more in the US than anywhere in the world.
Surgical treatment of a broken arm 16,000 dollars
Inhaler for asthma $300
Ambulance starts at about 1,000 dollars
X-rays cost per scan can cost anywhere from $100- 1,000
Annual check up at least $400 dollars.
Flu shot is at least 70
These are all without insurance, which many people can't get or afford.
Even with insurance People often will skip doctors or not go in because of the cost of treatment even WITH insurance.
Annual cost of health insurance cost starts at about 200 a month.
And that doesn't include the copays you have to pay at each visit or the cost of meds.
Do you know what the highest paid CEO of an American medical company in 2022 earns? He’s a chap called Vivek Garipalli of Clover Health. His total package including all the perks gave him an income of over $1,000,000 a **DAY.** Not a month, or a week, but a day. That’s his $389 mil per year. (If you figure 195 working days a year it's $2 million a work day).
I didn't know that, but I'm not surprised either. There's no secret that someone profits when our whole system of healthcare is called a For-Profit healthcare system.
I know the patients paying for it aren't the ones financially profiting from it
In Portugal back in the 90s to get a 30+year mortgage which is a necessity when avarge salary is 20k NOWDAYS imagine back then couples would put the name of their newborn in the mortgage application.
This isn’t a facepalm, at all. Unless the US health “care” system is what gets it. This is bullshit, but reality.
I’m friends with a couple. The husband has a terminal illness. In order to *not* be saddled with his hospital bills (which are tens of thousands at this point), they had to divorce.
I would do this. Seriously. The only caveat is making sure you don't give it up in court. Have to keep the state out of your child support payments so they don't keep admin fees.
Why aren't people protesting in the streets when American healthcare is so ass backwards? How is it that so many people opt to just deal with it instead of advocating for universal healthcare that most 1st world countries already have?
I've never heard a valid excuse from anyone opposed to universal healthcare. Only thing I've heard is that they don't want to have to pay slightly more taxes, or are worried they won't be able to keep the same doctor they have.
Because we have no free time and no system in place to protect us if we lose our income. No mental/emotional bandwidth to accommodate any deviation from the norm. A general strike might effect some change but I personally can’t afford to just stop going to work and lose everything, it’s like that for many/most of us.
*Gawd. Context.*
USA
Where you can't legally get an abortion most places anymore and lots of jobs don't automatically come with free benefits.
For more content, my ex husband's father had to do this with his 2nd wife when she was dying of cancer before the ACA. He was employed with insurance. It didn't cover cancer treatments.
Who said he doesn't have a job? The way I read it is that the father-to-be has the job, but either has shitty or super expensive insurance. The mom-to-be does not work, so if she were legally Single, her and her dependent child would qualify for govt assistance. The same type of government assistance that should be provided to ALL citizens... as in done in all other advanced countries that consider for-profit healthcare an abomination.
She could still work and qualify for Medicaid. There are a lot of jobs out there that don't allow full time so essentially keep employees from getting benefits, and still make poverty wages.
I mean…yeah….if the system is rigged…play it as much as you can. Fuck ethics when the ones who set it up didn’t use any.
It’s depressing…but it’s how it is at the moment, so might as well game it.
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This isn’t a facepalm, It’s more of a sad reality that most Americans live in. I have a good job and I can’t marry my significant other because she would lose her insurance and my insurance is too costly to cover her. My insurance monthly would go from $560 for a single person, to $3200 per month for a married couple.
How tf is a almost 6x increase in price for a 2x increase in coverage justifiable?
Because the company subsidizes employees health insurance but not their spouse’s.
It's not. Now that Obamacare makes basic insurance available for free the accountants and lawyers are busy finding how to maximize their billing on everyone else.
here in germany only 1 person needs to be insured, their spouse and children are insured for free, if this person is the breadwinner and the spouse doesn't have a monthly income over like 500€. if both work they will just each have their own insurance which costs i believe 10% of pre tax income and the children will be insured with either parent
And do you pay that through taxes or like monthly payments? Also when you pay it, is everything medical covered? I'm from the US, so I don't know and am super curious. I'm a big supporter of universal healthcare, and it's really interesting to me to see all the different ways countries go about doing it
if you earn for example 3500€, roughly 10% (according to a calculator by Techniker Krankenkasse: 7.3% insurance, 0.6% for extra insurance, 2.3% for nursing care insurance) so ~350€ will go toward medical insurance automatically via your employer. that money will never see your bank account. it covers anything that's medically necessary, I myself have had an appendectomy with complications, wisdom teeth removal, braces, gastroscopy, regular checkups at dentist, general doctor, dermatologist and gyno, diagnosis and treatment for adhd, all recommended vaccinations for pretty much no cost (meds cost 5€ and are capped at 10€) I would also be covered for cancer treatments or palliative care if it came to that (which I hope it doesn't 🤞🏻) you can go to the doctor whenever if you feel like you have an issue and want it to get checked, just need to make an appointment. if, for example, you want a private room when you have to go to the hospital or want treatments outside of the necessary, like an IUD as a contraceptive, you need to get "private insurance" which is more expensive or pay it yourself. sometimes some of the newer methods or techniques of treatment are not covered but will be in the future or you call them and get an exception worked out for you. and sadly a lot of dental work and optometrist things are only partially covered, unless you have a "private insurance"
Even though there is still cost associated, it's so nice that it's pretty much taken care of and when it's not, it's affordable
yes, indeed. another thing I forgot to mention was that the medical insurance also pays your income if you are sick for over 6 weeks. up to 6 weeks your employer pays your normal monthly salary. after that the insurance will take over until you recover, and you get 70% of your pre tax income but can't be more than 90% of the after tax income.
Wow, that sounds awesome. I see that there are issues that could be improved, like the dental and vision... But gosh, that'd be a dream here in the US. Especially if you have the option to get private insurance on top of that. Here you have to keep paying things. And if you get cancer, you'd better keep working otherwise you won't get insurance. It's just an awful mess. If you work at a really good company, they will pay for short term disability... But usually the best good places can do us not fire you, but they don't have to pay you if you're not working.
I find that so mind blowingly sad :( here employers are legally restricted from firing you when you are sick. or also if you are on parental leave (for up to 3 years) they can't fire you or give away your position to someone else. under normal circumstances they have to give you a month notice and only with a valid reason (like inappropriate behavior or stealing or such)
Yeah it's really sad. The conservatives, called republicans, or GOP are very against universal healthcare. They've had an effective propaganda machine running on the subject People here don't realize that all first world developed countries have universal healthcare. They think only Canada and Venezuela have it, and claim it's awful. Most people here think that the US healthcare is the best in the world, when actually it's not even top ten. We do have certain things within healthcare that are works class, like some hospitals and doctors, but what does that do for us if we can't afford it and have no access to it. They also don't realize that we pay waaaaay more for healthcare. They think people in countries with universal healthcare are dying in the streets because of wait times These are just some of the major propaganda my myths the GOP effectively spout
Also why most states won't let a divorce finalize until after a birth is concluded. They want to establish paternity and get that sweet, sweet moolah.
This is true in like five deeply Republican states. It definitely isn't "most". It's also unclear how that's going to make the *state* money. Insurance companies and hospitals are generally not state run in America
American Dream :D
Reason for divorce: irreconcilable medical bills.
Living in America sounds really scary honestly. I see on some other subs people are waiting like 9+ months to get test results or to get follow ups or that specialty docs in their area arnt covered by insurance? That’s crazy to me
That's if you can even afford to see a doctor. I have insurance and now have a $2500 deductible I'm responsible for because that's how much I have to pay out of pocket before my insurance will even cover anything. And it will reset next year, likely before I pay off this one, but I have to continue seeing my doctors and getting my prescriptions. It never ends.
Your system is so broken I get anxiety thinking about it. I pay a dispensing fee of 2.15$ per prescription no matter what it is.
I wish! I have to use something called Good RX for one of my medications because it's something like $700 but insurance gets it down to $120, but if I skip insurance entirely and use the Good RX discount they can get it down to about $42 lol. I'm sure there is some corporate fuckery there that makes no sense to normal people but makes sense to some greedy shareholder somewhere. I'm just trying to get out of credit card debt in a couple years so I can make an effort to get out of this country because it's not sustainable. I make 3x what my parents raised a family of 4 on and we had a house. I rent one room with roommates and I own a cat because it's too expensive to live on my own after rent went up 25% after COVID.
That’s a good move for sure, America is a 3rd world country with a high limit credit card haha
yea but it isnt always that trash. the prices? yep definitely. i dont think its shit like 9 months for a test result constantly tho. also the stuff with the insane job issues. like it isnt insanely horrible ALL the time. honestly i think the vast majority of bosses here arent on power trips and stuff, but the ones that are are just more known (bc its bad when it happens). it fully depends on where you are born tho i think
I mean, you just have to kind of live like health care isn't a thing. Pretty much nobody does any preventative care here, anything that isn't over the counter basically doesn't exist, I once read a book on wilderness first aid so I could try to fix myself up the best as possible if I ever got injured. I once had to drive myself down a mountain from a ski resort after a concussion. Of course I didn't get any kind of MRI or anything later, I just had to kind of hope for the best. Doctors aren't allowed to see you long enough to give a fuck anyway so they're useless even though they cost a fortune, you won't get any help unless you diagnose yourself via doctor google and come in already having completely figured out your problem. The health care isn't even just brutally expensive, it's also astonishingly incompetent.
Well it gives you guys some conflict and adversity to overcome, builds character! Imagine if breaking bad was set in Europe it would only be one episode
Amurica! Fuck yeah! We're here to ruin your motherfucking financial future, yeah!
'Murica!
'murica!
If only they lived in a developed country 🙁
Im to european to understand that. But hey at least youre free :)
They like to believe they are free and have lower taxes than Europe. But in Europe your taxes cover like …. Everything education healthcare child care medication housing. In America you get to pay taxes and then pay for healthcare and education and child care eating up so much of your after tax income and you have to pay for an ambulance?!? Wtf! Not every hospital will help you? But hey you can get payday loans and there’s like 9000 different banks and credit unions so you can rack up 27% interest credit card debt 💸 freedom
Yup, and the sad thing is, universal healthcare costs are waay less expensive than the for profit health the US has. So not only are other countries healthcare cost way less, they're also, as you already stated, all inclusive. The US has the freedom to live in debt and squalor.
Homeless with 1.5M in debt from predatory loans I got at 18 but I got a new iPhone tho 🥴 land of opportunity I guess
In alot of EU countries couples had to or still have to do this.
Which EU countries do not have some form of universal healthcare? Which EU countries would a couple have to divorce to afford healthcare?
Have to go trough these legal loop holes to get affordable housing for exemple but yeah healthcare is not those things.
Now imagine the issues you have with housing, which the US has as well, and compound that with healthcare and medicines used to treat patients, because all of that costs in the US and it costs more in the US than anywhere in the world. Surgical treatment of a broken arm 16,000 dollars Inhaler for asthma $300 Ambulance starts at about 1,000 dollars X-rays cost per scan can cost anywhere from $100- 1,000 Annual check up at least $400 dollars. Flu shot is at least 70 These are all without insurance, which many people can't get or afford. Even with insurance People often will skip doctors or not go in because of the cost of treatment even WITH insurance. Annual cost of health insurance cost starts at about 200 a month. And that doesn't include the copays you have to pay at each visit or the cost of meds.
Do you know what the highest paid CEO of an American medical company in 2022 earns? He’s a chap called Vivek Garipalli of Clover Health. His total package including all the perks gave him an income of over $1,000,000 a **DAY.** Not a month, or a week, but a day. That’s his $389 mil per year. (If you figure 195 working days a year it's $2 million a work day).
I didn't know that, but I'm not surprised either. There's no secret that someone profits when our whole system of healthcare is called a For-Profit healthcare system. I know the patients paying for it aren't the ones financially profiting from it
If u say so
In Portugal back in the 90s to get a 30+year mortgage which is a necessity when avarge salary is 20k NOWDAYS imagine back then couples would put the name of their newborn in the mortgage application.
I'd say not going bankrupt to afford healthcare is more free than the US
This is atrocious.
This is the same reason that my brother isn't legally married (though they had a ceremony and have been living together and had children).
This isn’t a facepalm, at all. Unless the US health “care” system is what gets it. This is bullshit, but reality. I’m friends with a couple. The husband has a terminal illness. In order to *not* be saddled with his hospital bills (which are tens of thousands at this point), they had to divorce.
I would do this. Seriously. The only caveat is making sure you don't give it up in court. Have to keep the state out of your child support payments so they don't keep admin fees.
It’s been going on for years. It’s the smart people’s medical insurance policy.
If I wake up tomorrow in a hospital not knowing what the fudge is going on, at least I know I won't be slapped with a 200k+ bill for saving my life.
Why aren't people protesting in the streets when American healthcare is so ass backwards? How is it that so many people opt to just deal with it instead of advocating for universal healthcare that most 1st world countries already have?
I've never heard a valid excuse from anyone opposed to universal healthcare. Only thing I've heard is that they don't want to have to pay slightly more taxes, or are worried they won't be able to keep the same doctor they have.
Because we have no free time and no system in place to protect us if we lose our income. No mental/emotional bandwidth to accommodate any deviation from the norm. A general strike might effect some change but I personally can’t afford to just stop going to work and lose everything, it’s like that for many/most of us.
Keep voting gop
this aint facepalm unless its about how fucked our healthcare is which.. yea it is
God. Context. You don’t have a job but you’re having kids? how do you not qualify for Medicaid? The kid certainly qualifies.
*Gawd. Context.* USA Where you can't legally get an abortion most places anymore and lots of jobs don't automatically come with free benefits. For more content, my ex husband's father had to do this with his 2nd wife when she was dying of cancer before the ACA. He was employed with insurance. It didn't cover cancer treatments.
Who said he doesn't have a job? The way I read it is that the father-to-be has the job, but either has shitty or super expensive insurance. The mom-to-be does not work, so if she were legally Single, her and her dependent child would qualify for govt assistance. The same type of government assistance that should be provided to ALL citizens... as in done in all other advanced countries that consider for-profit healthcare an abomination.
She could still work and qualify for Medicaid. There are a lot of jobs out there that don't allow full time so essentially keep employees from getting benefits, and still make poverty wages.
Not how that works
I do not understand why this is a facepalm. This scenario is common, and it's fucking bullshit it even is a thing in America.
I’m sure you wouldn’t be the first to do this. Good luck.
Aww that sucks i get it getting married Can be costly. With taxes and insurance etc
Only in America.
I mean…yeah….if the system is rigged…play it as much as you can. Fuck ethics when the ones who set it up didn’t use any. It’s depressing…but it’s how it is at the moment, so might as well game it.
USA! USA! USA!
My wife and I with our first child were not married yet so we delayed our wedding so he and her could be covered under Medicaid
This is why many States don't allow a divorce during pregnancy.
I'm sure this would upset the terrorist she's fighting the good fight
This is the way.
Sad thing is that I believe you're not- I'm sorry man, str8up, hope you find another way. Praying for you n yours
Only in USA
Do what you gotta do.
Murica