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I've heard anecdotally that negative health shocks can lead to terrible wealth loss as healthcare is very expensive. Is relationship of the magnitude that coul

by lynal 9y ago

I've heard anecdotally that negative health shocks can lead to terrible wealth loss as healthcare is very expensive. Is relationship of the magnitude that could impact these results?

delinka 9y ago
Sounds like a viscous, dangerous, terrible feedback loop.
- heiie9292 9y ago
  Welcome to human society, where for thousands of years the masses are forced into negative feedback loops pushed by ruling elites Today it’s jobs and economics A break from thousands of years of Praise Jesus! Or some other Abrhamic BS, though it appears to be mounting an (attempt) at a comeback Keep $minority from having a job so we can use them as a lazy target, humans keep existing in cavemen level feedback loops Like what addition and subtraction are to math, these things are the repeatedly employed operators in human society Marginalize, divide, demean, impoverish. Grown men with billions will cry over losing millions, and keep telling men and women with less to grow up and work harder after they just flushed their retirement or savings down the tubes on housing bubbles thus perpetuating the operations
ghaff 9y ago
Negative health shocks can also lead to wealth loss because they can impact the ability to work and can require help of various kinds--even outside of actual healthcare costs that may be covered by insurance to various degrees.
sdhgaiojfsa 9y ago
Unless they controlled for it, this seems like the obvious primary cause of the observed effect. Especially since this was mostly a pre-ACA period where many more people were uninsured. I don't see any indication that they did control for this, so I'm not updating my beliefs very much about the health effects of losing your wealth via non-medical expense mechanisms.
diffeomorphism 9y ago
This is discussed in the Limitations section of their article: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2677445 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2677445 > Third, despite adjusting for conditions that frequently precipitate wealth shocks, including marital disruption, unemployment, and a variety of health status and access to care indicators, residual confounding is likely. They adjusted for it, but maybe not enough.
Panino 9y ago
I used to work with a homeless shelter and the director told me the #1 cause of homelessness was sudden massive healthcare bills. This can even extend to caring family members who foot the bill, leaving them financially at the edge, just before suffering some shock of their own.
- jcadam 9y ago
  Hmm... seems like if someone in your household is diagnosed with some terrible (expensive to treat) illness, you should just operate under the assumption that you will be declaring bankruptcy after all is said and done. And therefore: - Do NOT touch IRAs or any other asset that might be protected during bankruptcy (i.e., don't liquidate everything in a futile attempt to keep up with the medical bills). - Pay as little as you can get away with on those medical bills during treatment. Then sort it all out in bankruptcy court.
  - kbenson 9y ago
    > Pay as little as you can get away with on those medical bills during treatment. Then sort it all out in bankruptcy court. That sounds like a good strategy anyway, since you can't ever be sure a procedure will fix a problem, even if it should, so future expenses are a fairly open question. You don't have a lot of options if after your first medical solution you've paid everyone in full and are out of money but the problem isn't resolved, but frugal rationing of payments might mean you have quite a few tries before your funds are exhausted (even if you've left a trail of partially paid bills). Unfortunately, I imagine the length of time involved means it's probably tricky to prevent past bills being reported as debt that might affect future actions.
    - Retric 9y ago
      Yea, this really depends on the illness but there is a lot of slack in the system. It can take 2-3 months before you get a bill after medical treatment add another 60-90 days before it's very late and you have 6 months or so before your credit get's trashed assuming zero payment. However, partial payments can push this out much further. Remember, companies don't want to sell you debt as they only get a fraction of it's total value so work with them. So, paying say 1% per month is often enough to avoid sending a very large bill to collections.

by lynal 9y ago

I've heard anecdotally that negative health shocks can lead to terrible wealth loss as healthcare is very expensive. Is relationship of the magnitude that could impact these results?

delinka 9y ago

Sounds like a viscous, dangerous, terrible feedback loop.

heiie9292 9y ago
Welcome to human society, where for thousands of years the masses are forced into negative feedback loops pushed by ruling elites Today it’s jobs and economics A break from thousands of years of Praise Jesus! Or some other Abrhamic BS, though it appears to be mounting an (attempt) at a comeback Keep $minority from having a job so we can use them as a lazy target, humans keep existing in cavemen level feedback loops Like what addition and subtraction are to math, these things are the repeatedly employed operators in human society Marginalize, divide, demean, impoverish. Grown men with billions will cry over losing millions, and keep telling men and women with less to grow up and work harder after they just flushed their retirement or savings down the tubes on housing bubbles thus perpetuating the operations

ghaff 9y ago

Negative health shocks can also lead to wealth loss because they can impact the ability to work and can require help of various kinds--even outside of actual healthcare costs that may be covered by insurance to various degrees.

sdhgaiojfsa 9y ago

Unless they controlled for it, this seems like the obvious primary cause of the observed effect. Especially since this was mostly a pre-ACA period where many more people were uninsured. I don't see any indication that they did control for this, so I'm not updating my beliefs very much about the health effects of losing your wealth via non-medical expense mechanisms.

diffeomorphism 9y ago

This is discussed in the Limitations section of their article: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2677445 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2677445 > Third, despite adjusting for conditions that frequently precipitate wealth shocks, including marital disruption, unemployment, and a variety of health status and access to care indicators, residual confounding is likely. They adjusted for it, but maybe not enough.

Panino 9y ago

I used to work with a homeless shelter and the director told me the #1 cause of homelessness was sudden massive healthcare bills. This can even extend to caring family members who foot the bill, leaving them financially at the edge, just before suffering some shock of their own.

jcadam 9y ago
Hmm... seems like if someone in your household is diagnosed with some terrible (expensive to treat) illness, you should just operate under the assumption that you will be declaring bankruptcy after all is said and done. And therefore: - Do NOT touch IRAs or any other asset that might be protected during bankruptcy (i.e., don't liquidate everything in a futile attempt to keep up with the medical bills). - Pay as little as you can get away with on those medical bills during treatment. Then sort it all out in bankruptcy court.
- kbenson 9y ago
  > Pay as little as you can get away with on those medical bills during treatment. Then sort it all out in bankruptcy court. That sounds like a good strategy anyway, since you can't ever be sure a procedure will fix a problem, even if it should, so future expenses are a fairly open question. You don't have a lot of options if after your first medical solution you've paid everyone in full and are out of money but the problem isn't resolved, but frugal rationing of payments might mean you have quite a few tries before your funds are exhausted (even if you've left a trail of partially paid bills). Unfortunately, I imagine the length of time involved means it's probably tricky to prevent past bills being reported as debt that might affect future actions.
  - Retric 9y ago
    Yea, this really depends on the illness but there is a lot of slack in the system. It can take 2-3 months before you get a bill after medical treatment add another 60-90 days before it's very late and you have 6 months or so before your credit get's trashed assuming zero payment. However, partial payments can push this out much further. Remember, companies don't want to sell you debt as they only get a fraction of it's total value so work with them. So, paying say 1% per month is often enough to avoid sending a very large bill to collections.