BuT bUt BuT tHe TaXeS!!
... I can almost guarantee the taxes are still less than the lost direct compensation from employers that instead goes to your insurance "benefit." :/
Last I checked the US spent more than any comparable country on healthcare/capita, roughly twice the OECD average.
And, they have to deal with medical bankruptcies, using Uber instead of ambulances, insulin rationing, and whatnot
yeah but why would I pay for healthcare if I'm healthy(now)!!??
American here.
We were taught in grade school that Europeans lived longer because of the Mediterranean diet they ate. They could eat good bread and drink red wine and out live us Americans.
Turns out it was universal healthcare. We'll never get it here, and we'll die earlier and poorer because of it.
The mediterranean and athlantic diets also help. But to have them you also need better quality foods, which are also worse in the US with all the derregulation.
Excuse me while I eat my super processed pringles, and wash it down with a super sugary drink.
Not to mention they don't live their lives in morbid anxiety over getting sick or injured. So that's years more of life just by not being stressed and being able to think clearly.
Only people who live in the Mediterranean eat the Mediterranean diet. Frankly just because it's better for you doesn't mean it's going to make you live longer necessarily it just won't make you live shorter. And maybe they won't have to make a special spherical coffin when you do die.
I live in the Netherlands. If I visit the hospital I have to pay my yearly deductible of €350 first. This person paid zero dollars because her travel insurance paid for it.
The Netherlands has the same system as Obamacare. Privatized insurance with government subsidies for low income. Only difference is that the government sorta acts like a single payer, they negotiate with big pharma over medicine prices and the government with the insurers make a price list for healthcare providers on what they can charge.
Of course a healthcare provider can decide to charge whatever they want but then insurance won’t cover that business.
I naively expected that all of Europe had health care figured out. The bullshit $450 USD bill I got in Sweden for existing in the same room with a doctor for 15 minutes taught me otherwise.
You know how in many poor countries, they'll charge you higher prices because they (rightly) think that you're a westerner and can thus pay much higher prices than the locals? I heavily suspect that was basically that. Swedes aren't paying $450 USD for 15 minutes doctor time.
I figured as much, but it was jarring to receive worse care and for way more money than I would have paid at home (even uninsured).
Yeah, as a German, the quality of care isn't necessarily that great (though I never experience the US healthcare system to compare). Many European countries have been heavily cutting corners in the last 1-2 decades. I've been to several doctors who, after waiting like 3 months for an appointment, have been practically useless. "I tried nothing and I'm all out of ideas" kind of shit, and for several different issues. They're fine with simple/obvious stuff, but once it's slightly difficult to figure out or any kind of mental health issue you're pretty much just going there to be able to tell your employer that you're trying, and maybe get lucky with medication.
I'm sure there's levels of competency, but it seems a large part of the failure of the US healthcare itself is when doctors have to try and convince the insurance corporation that they do have education and experience and the procedure or medication they recommended to help someone is valid. As if the insurance company knows better and is trying to protect the patient... right.
Prior Authorizations as an idea, are just the insurance company playing doctor. They should be illegal, the company doesn't have a medical license.
Your experience is more realistic than the one in the post. EU citizens in EU countries "don't pay" for healthcare services because it's already paid through taxes, foreigners are supposed to be billed because they don't pay taxes in the EU. (it doesn't always happen tho, you know, administrative error, oops)
Not necessarily true for all foreigners. Australia has reciprocal healthcare agreements with many EU countries. That means if an Aussie visits those countries, healthcare is covered and the opposite is true as well. Whereas that wouldn't apply for a USian.
My daughter was in Ireland and had a problem that would have cost her a minimum of four thousand in the US with insurance. Her cost was 75 euros. They apologized for it not being complexly free.
Did you guys think we were just all collectively lying to you about this shit?
Hey, Grammy's cancer bill just came in and it's 1 million euros, tell the Americans it was free though.
I'm financially destroyed but at least I can make fun of Americans
Pointing out that "free" healthcare is actually paid for by somebody is seen as a killer gotcha in the conservative world. They assume that as soon as somebody learns that they are paying money into taxes that benefit other people, they will also flip out and fight tooth and nail to stop it.
Keep pushing and they might hit you with another zinger, like how the US is not a democracy, it's a republic! 🤯
Here’s a fun fact, though…people in the US pay more in taxes towards healthcare than we do here in the UK. And then they have to pay on top of that.
It’s almost as if having an entire for-profit industry acting as middle-men doesn’t lead to the best value for money.
Despite less than half of the USA’s total healthcare expenditure coming from government expenditure or compulsory insurance schemes, it still spends more per person on these financing schemes than the UK- £3,111 in the USA in 2014, compared with £2,210 in the UK.
Oh your think your firemen are FREE do you?? Hmmmm gotcha lib
they do, with a shit load of propaganda.
mostly they focus on diminishing the value of public healthcare, and compare it with the best theoretical private service you could get.
look at those dirty europoors with dirt cheap healthcare and endless waiting times (both lies), and compare it with what a CEO can afford in there states. you see? US private system is better.
unless you're poor or middle class who can't afford to live, in which case, fuck you.
Insurance is just a scam to keep people enslaved to jobs for their premiums and coverage. If only quality care wasn't tied to employers' insurance we might actually have competition back in the market. Have better products and a livable state of life. As someone on Medicare I can't afford a 400% increase to my premium after tax credits are slashed in the coming years. Socialism is at least a band aid to our monolithic oppressive capitalist economy.
Its just privatized socialism, where the rich get subsidized by the poors who have it but cant afford the minimum and co pays to actually use it.
This is misleading. Also in Europe people need to pay for healthcare - it’s just that the costs are lower and more equally distributed. It does happen that a foreigner is treated for free (should the hospital decided that billing is too much hassle, but that happens verrry rarely).
in France and the UK I'm quite sure you're treated for free, or I'm living in a fairytale, which is possible also
I am from Germany, I was billed like 700€ for a small checkup in a hospital in France because of an infection in my mouth after an operation. They first couldn't find me, because they didn't write my address right. so I had a collection agency writing mean letters to me, wanting more money.
I gave it to my healthcare provider and they sorted it out and paid it without questions ✨
This is just off the top of my head, so the numbers are approximate.
In France it's (of course) a bit complicated in that you often pay first and then get partially reimbursed by the state system. If I go to my doctor and get a prescription, I'll pay about 20€ for the consultation + about 8€ for the medicine, no matter what it is, but will have about 70% of that paid back to my bank account later. If I were to go the hospital and have to stay overnight, I'll get charged a considerable amount for the treatment, medication and the hospital bed (and have that also partially reimbursed). However, there's a sliding scale of cosmetic to serious treatments that are reimbursed at progressively higher rates. This means you pay more for trivial stuff and less for important stuff up to life-threatening illnesses (e.g. cancer) for which the treatment is free (I think, I've not had one).
I pay around 8% of my annual income in health tax. Most people pay extra for private medical insurance (around 50€ a month, typically) in order to have all costs fully covered. The insurance companies are strictly regulated and pay out. I had a tooth pulled and it cost me 8€. If I want to replace it with an implant, it's 800€.
France is complicated.
In the UK there's usually no charge at all for a consultation or hospital treatment. Prescriptions are about £9 per item, no matter what the drug is. I pay approximately 11% of my annual income in health tax. Some people still pay extra for private health insurance in order to get preferential treatment and increase the inequality.
The above applies to residents, not to visitors unless their country has special agreement with the UK or French governments.
source: I've lived in both countries and I've almost bored myself into a coma by typing all this unnecessary detail.
I mean if fascism isn't enough of an incentive to leave a shitty country i don't know what is.
You are not getting healthcare before you do your homework (a revolution deposing your oligarchs).
Lots of people can't leave. Be it because of finances, or their skill set not being needed to get a visa in another country
Unless countries start to recognize the situation in the US as asylum worthy, there's not much one can do to leave the country
I have a friend who is a doctor and technically speaking Americans should get charged for medical treatment and then their insurance should pay for it, after all they are not citizens and don't pay taxes. But no one seems all that clear on how to actually bill them so it almost always never happens.
The American system is so batshit crazy that no one else from any other country knows how to interface with it.
And all of that collective real cost to administer is a tiny fraction of what an American would pay not only out of pocket, but also the monthly premiums both they and their employer pay to the insurance company. Who will initially deny the claim just as a matter of policy, regardless of whether it's covered or submitted correctly.
Then they will deny again because the ID code they used to bill it isn't "right" or it supposedly falls into some bullshit loophole documented nowhere. So both the patient and doctor's staff have to spend dozens of hours collectively wasting their time fighting to get something simple actually handled like it should be.
Sounds like COMMUNISM to me!
As an American, I'll gladly support the world's greatest economy by paying a few thousand to get checked out. Know why all these European countries are so poor? Because their health insurance and private health care companies barely make anything.
Do your part! Contribute to the economy!
God bless America!
Actually, private health companies make bank. Where I live, public health care is top notch, but you may have waiting lists, or have to share a room, and things like that. Private companies often provide more immediate appointments, single hospital rooms, certain diagnostics on demand, etc. Quite a few people either pay to have those plans, or their employer does. This is on top of public health care, not instead. You can have your cake and eat it too.
Americans don't have health care. We have health insurance. Think about your car insurance vs a warranty. That's the difference. We have a system in place that we want to be something it was never designed to be.
I'm sure Trump would say that it was because the USA subsidized all your services because Americans created healthcare and everyone else is stealing it.
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