3 ms·

Prices in Germany are set by the government. If you check the Gebührenordnung für Ärzte you'll see that in private practice an abdominal MRI is EUR 256.46. The

Prices in Germany are set by the government. If you check the Gebührenordnung für Ärzte you'll see that in private practice an abdominal MRI is EUR 256.46. The US are a clear outlier.

vidarh 5y ago
Makes sense, given the prices I've seen for London and the prices someone quoted for Poland. Makes the US pricing in this article even more bizarre - in "normal times" you could literally fly to Europe for an MRI and save money.
sneak 5y ago
Correspondingly, senior SWEs at startups in Germany struggle to earn above €100k/y.
- HarryHirsch 5y ago
  Even so, medical bankruptcies are not a thing in Germany.
- messe 5y ago
  What exactly is your point? That it is worth it that people go bankrupt due to medical issues because it means that certain professions can earn 6 figures? I’m really curious. What do you think you are saying? How do you think those two statements correspond? Do you genuinely believe that if the majority of Europe were to ditch its public health services that salaries would go up and that that would be a good thing?
  - sneak 5y ago
    My point is that even if you have to pay market rates for private healthcare insurance in the US (which are crazy high), the overall system in the US works better for many HN-types because while your expenses may be much higher, your income is disproportionately higher (as in 2-5x higher). FWIW, I am a US person, resident in Germany.
    - petschge 5y ago
      So you are saying that HN-types got theirs (the huge salary), so they should not care about others? Or are you causing them of a "I got mine, fuck you" attitude? I am still not sure what you are trying to say. But the fact that you LEFT the US that has that kind of dynamic for Germany, where income inequality is smaller and many things -- including medicine -- are more widely accessible makes me scratch my head.
      - sneak 5y ago
        > So you are saying that HN-types got theirs (the huge salary), so they should not care about others? Or are you causing them of a "I got mine, fuck you" attitude? Neither of those things, no. (Also, if you think of €100k as "a huge salary", you should recalibrate; in the industrialized world it is not.) > I am still not sure what you are trying to say. But the fact that you LEFT the US that has that kind of dynamic for Germany, where income inequality is smaller and many things -- including medicine -- are more widely accessible makes me scratch my head. The healthcare in Germany appears to be somewhat crap compared to the highest level of care available in the US. It's an order of magnitude cheaper, though. I left the US because the US is a police state, not because best-in-the-world healthcare has highest-in-the-world prices. My comment could best be summarized as "health care costs should not be a major concern in your life as a SWE because they will be cheap (to you) everywhere, so make your SWE life choices based on other things". You can inaccurately paraphrase this as a rejection of concern for social justice, income inequality, or a generalized "fuck you, got mine" at your own peril. (FWIW, I think national boundaries are mostly irrelevant and unimportant, and drawing the boundary of your official-concern-for-the-wellbeing-of-others at an invisible line checkpoint to be somewhat closeminded. There are billions without meaningful modern healthcare access at all (or even clean water) so the selfrighteous indignation bit about the relative quality and expense of healthcare in two major industrialized western nations is sort of a silly nit to pick.)
    - messe 5y ago
      So you believe that because you’re paying only for private healthcare you’re income is higher?

Prices in Germany are set by the government. If you check the Gebührenordnung für Ärzte you'll see that in private practice an abdominal MRI is EUR 256.46. The US are a clear outlier.

vidarh 5y ago

Makes sense, given the prices I've seen for London and the prices someone quoted for Poland. Makes the US pricing in this article even more bizarre - in "normal times" you could literally fly to Europe for an MRI and save money.

sneak 5y ago

Correspondingly, senior SWEs at startups in Germany struggle to earn above €100k/y.

HarryHirsch 5y ago
Even so, medical bankruptcies are not a thing in Germany.
messe 5y ago
What exactly is your point? That it is worth it that people go bankrupt due to medical issues because it means that certain professions can earn 6 figures? I’m really curious. What do you think you are saying? How do you think those two statements correspond? Do you genuinely believe that if the majority of Europe were to ditch its public health services that salaries would go up and that that would be a good thing?
- sneak 5y ago
  My point is that even if you have to pay market rates for private healthcare insurance in the US (which are crazy high), the overall system in the US works better for many HN-types because while your expenses may be much higher, your income is disproportionately higher (as in 2-5x higher). FWIW, I am a US person, resident in Germany.
  - petschge 5y ago
    So you are saying that HN-types got theirs (the huge salary), so they should not care about others? Or are you causing them of a "I got mine, fuck you" attitude? I am still not sure what you are trying to say. But the fact that you LEFT the US that has that kind of dynamic for Germany, where income inequality is smaller and many things -- including medicine -- are more widely accessible makes me scratch my head.
    - sneak 5y ago
      > So you are saying that HN-types got theirs (the huge salary), so they should not care about others? Or are you causing them of a "I got mine, fuck you" attitude? Neither of those things, no. (Also, if you think of €100k as "a huge salary", you should recalibrate; in the industrialized world it is not.) > I am still not sure what you are trying to say. But the fact that you LEFT the US that has that kind of dynamic for Germany, where income inequality is smaller and many things -- including medicine -- are more widely accessible makes me scratch my head. The healthcare in Germany appears to be somewhat crap compared to the highest level of care available in the US. It's an order of magnitude cheaper, though. I left the US because the US is a police state, not because best-in-the-world healthcare has highest-in-the-world prices. My comment could best be summarized as "health care costs should not be a major concern in your life as a SWE because they will be cheap (to you) everywhere, so make your SWE life choices based on other things". You can inaccurately paraphrase this as a rejection of concern for social justice, income inequality, or a generalized "fuck you, got mine" at your own peril. (FWIW, I think national boundaries are mostly irrelevant and unimportant, and drawing the boundary of your official-concern-for-the-wellbeing-of-others at an invisible line checkpoint to be somewhat closeminded. There are billions without meaningful modern healthcare access at all (or even clean water) so the selfrighteous indignation bit about the relative quality and expense of healthcare in two major industrialized western nations is sort of a silly nit to pick.)
  - messe 5y ago
    So you believe that because you’re paying only for private healthcare you’re income is higher?