5 ms·

Lack of national healthcare really puts a damper on free labor movement in the US. You want to start a company but also have health insurance for your family? T

Lack of national healthcare really puts a damper on free labor movement in the US. You want to start a company but also have health insurance for your family? That'll be $12,000 with a massive deductible... Gets in the way of a lot of would be entrepreneurs

GiorgioG 5y ago
As much as I'd like to agree (I am pro-national healthcare for the US) - if you don't have $20,000 (let's say that covers your annual premiums & deductible) - you sure as heck don't have the funds to quit your job and become a full-time entrepreneur.
- yarcob 5y ago
  You can start a software business in Austria with just a laptop and get health insurance for 32€/month (total social security payments if you don't make profits are about 150€/month). Fees for registering a company are waived/reduced for founders. I had nowhere near $20000 when I started. Sure, if you want to open a capital intensive business like a restaurant, you'll need more money. But that's the same everywhere.
  - woodson 5y ago
    It's somewhat more difficult for founding a limited liability company there, where the capital requirements are much higher than in most other countries (Eur 35K).
    - yarcob 5y ago
      Yeah, that's why most founders don't actually register a GmbH. Many small businesses are sole proprietors, even businesses with a few employees.
      - 7steps2much 5y ago
        Isn't it possible to fund a "mini" GmbH with only 10.000€ and build up to the 35.000€ over a span of a couple of years or something? I think I remember something like that being the case.
        yarcob 5y ago
        In my opinion the capital requirements are really not the biggest hurdle. If you start a GmbH, you have so many extra accounting requirements and everything gets more complicated. You also pay a lot more taxes in most cases. So it's something that many people try to avoid.
jjcon 5y ago
If you aren’t raking it in personally you can just get a cheap option from the exchange - if you are raking it in you can afford it
reader_mode 5y ago
The EU is no different with regards to movement. Just consider public health care in say Norway and in Bulgaria. Yeah it's financed indirectly by public funding but the quality can be terrible. In Croatia (where I'm from) you will regularly wait for 6+ months on life altering procedures and tests. And the public health system is in a constant crisis because of underfunding and overuse - just a few months ago drug suppliers cut off a few big public hospitals because the debt was insane (and the entire system is operating with billions of debt rolling over for years). The upside is because of such huge disparities in standard of living, if you can work remotely you can afford to use all private healthcare that's actually decent and affordable by western standards (it's built for medical tourism for western countries).
- StreamBright 5y ago
  For those who never experienced state run healthcare it sounds like an amazing idea. It is free! It is for all! Amazing. I usually ask my friends from the US how much do they like the service at DMV. Usually they hate it. So you want your healthcare to be run as DMV? Healthcare is great when you have a choice. The private healthcare industry is booming in Easter Europe now because there are people who can afford it. The state run hospitals are the last thing that are a monopoly, so it remains very badly managed, inefficient and extremely dangerous. I have lost many relatives in such institutions, because of infections due to lack of cleaning or hospital staff ignoring basic things. I think based on statistics the best option is private healthcare with state sponsored minimum insurance, something similar to the Dutch way.
  - kpmah 5y ago
    The NHS is one of the most efficient health systems in the world.
    - StreamBright 5y ago
      And? What is your point? The Dutch is also one of the best. Singapore too. You can bring examples pro contra for both types. I think the regulation that makes a healthcare good or bad, not that it is private or public. Many public healthcares are in Eastern Europe are bad. Some private healthcares are also bad. I still think that a combination of private and public offering is probably the best with regulation being the QA. My previous comment was to point out that public healthcares can be bad, if it was not clear. Many of my friends do not want to have any nuanced discussion just, public good, private bad. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_Netherlands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_Netherlands
refurb 5y ago
I keep hearing this but just to the North in Canada the entrepreneurship is much weaker but nobody worries about healthcare.

GiorgioG 5y ago

As much as I'd like to agree (I am pro-national healthcare for the US) - if you don't have $20,000 (let's say that covers your annual premiums & deductible) - you sure as heck don't have the funds to quit your job and become a full-time entrepreneur.

yarcob 5y ago
You can start a software business in Austria with just a laptop and get health insurance for 32€/month (total social security payments if you don't make profits are about 150€/month). Fees for registering a company are waived/reduced for founders. I had nowhere near $20000 when I started. Sure, if you want to open a capital intensive business like a restaurant, you'll need more money. But that's the same everywhere.
- woodson 5y ago
  It's somewhat more difficult for founding a limited liability company there, where the capital requirements are much higher than in most other countries (Eur 35K).
  - yarcob 5y ago
    Yeah, that's why most founders don't actually register a GmbH. Many small businesses are sole proprietors, even businesses with a few employees.
    - 7steps2much 5y ago
      Isn't it possible to fund a "mini" GmbH with only 10.000€ and build up to the 35.000€ over a span of a couple of years or something? I think I remember something like that being the case.
      - yarcob 5y ago
        In my opinion the capital requirements are really not the biggest hurdle. If you start a GmbH, you have so many extra accounting requirements and everything gets more complicated. You also pay a lot more taxes in most cases. So it's something that many people try to avoid.

jjcon 5y ago

If you aren’t raking it in personally you can just get a cheap option from the exchange - if you are raking it in you can afford it

reader_mode 5y ago

The EU is no different with regards to movement. Just consider public health care in say Norway and in Bulgaria. Yeah it's financed indirectly by public funding but the quality can be terrible. In Croatia (where I'm from) you will regularly wait for 6+ months on life altering procedures and tests. And the public health system is in a constant crisis because of underfunding and overuse - just a few months ago drug suppliers cut off a few big public hospitals because the debt was insane (and the entire system is operating with billions of debt rolling over for years). The upside is because of such huge disparities in standard of living, if you can work remotely you can afford to use all private healthcare that's actually decent and affordable by western standards (it's built for medical tourism for western countries).

StreamBright 5y ago
For those who never experienced state run healthcare it sounds like an amazing idea. It is free! It is for all! Amazing. I usually ask my friends from the US how much do they like the service at DMV. Usually they hate it. So you want your healthcare to be run as DMV? Healthcare is great when you have a choice. The private healthcare industry is booming in Easter Europe now because there are people who can afford it. The state run hospitals are the last thing that are a monopoly, so it remains very badly managed, inefficient and extremely dangerous. I have lost many relatives in such institutions, because of infections due to lack of cleaning or hospital staff ignoring basic things. I think based on statistics the best option is private healthcare with state sponsored minimum insurance, something similar to the Dutch way.
- kpmah 5y ago
  The NHS is one of the most efficient health systems in the world.
  - StreamBright 5y ago
    And? What is your point? The Dutch is also one of the best. Singapore too. You can bring examples pro contra for both types. I think the regulation that makes a healthcare good or bad, not that it is private or public. Many public healthcares are in Eastern Europe are bad. Some private healthcares are also bad. I still think that a combination of private and public offering is probably the best with regulation being the QA. My previous comment was to point out that public healthcares can be bad, if it was not clear. Many of my friends do not want to have any nuanced discussion just, public good, private bad. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_Netherlands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthcare_in_the_Netherlands

refurb 5y ago

I keep hearing this but just to the North in Canada the entrepreneurship is much weaker but nobody worries about healthcare.