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>But shouldn't a job paying 6 figures have decent insurance? Parent said he/she isn't from the US where this would be the norm. Here in the EU (Austria), in m

>But shouldn't a job paying 6 figures have decent insurance? Parent said he/she isn't from the US where this would be the norm. Here in the EU (Austria), in most cases you get no extra private insurance even with a high salary, just your public one, which in some cases may not be enough, especially if you optimize for quality doctors/therapists with short waiting times, which are all private, so you end up having to dig into your savings if you care about your health (who doesn't?). Still, at least even the poor and unemployed have access to half decent healthcare without going bankrupt so there's at least one silver lining.

giantg2 5y ago
That's fair. I guess the interesting part is that many of the people in the US want public healthcare and generally think that the international examples cover everything.
- ChuckNorris89 5y ago
  Like someone else here said it, universal healthcare isn't some magical talisman that makes all your health issues go away as long as you pay your taxes. Sure, if you have life threatening condition that needs to be addressed ASAP or else you'll die, you usually get taken care of without it ruining you financially like in the US would, but since the public system is massively understaffed and underfunded, then many health issues which are not life threatening but still impact your quality of life, can end up being out of packet, which sucks, as most Europeans aren't exactly rolling in disposable income (but at least they're not heavily in debt either). For example, in Austria, the amount of free care you get in case of an accident depend on where it happened. If it's at work, or on your way to/from work, then everything is fully covered, but if you get injured in your spare time, then only life threatening stuff is covered, for the rest, quality of life issues, you have to pay out of packet to have them fixed or have private accident insurance. Basically the public healthcare covers as little as to get you able-bodied to get back to work again, that's it. If you also want to feel 100% again, then you gotta pay up out of pocket. Since medical school is basically free, Austria has 3x the doctors per capita than the US, yet waiting times for specialists or some procedures are far longer. Why is that, you ask? Because most doctors here don't like being burned out in the understaffed public system, so once they served their "minimum sentence" in the public system to cover their "debt" for their public education, they go into private practice, which means that despite having 3x the doctors than the US, the public system is in a perpetual shortage of personnel. The state just doesn't have enough money to pay for every heath issue for everyone, but only the gravest of heath issues, and with our ageing population and stagnating economy, the situation is getting worse by the year. I heard Sweden, Finland and other rich EU countries have similar issues in their public system.
- legitster 5y ago
  This is a good reminder that people in the US have such a myopic view of our own issues. https://twitter.com/BadEconTakes/status/1228143455399858176 https://twitter.com/BadEconTakes/status/1228143455399858176 A better way to understand our problems is that our medicaid and medicare programs are the most generous in the world - so much so that extending it universally is so friggin expensive.
  - ChuckNorris89 5y ago
    >so much so that extending it universally is so friggin expensive I laughed out loud at the idea of the US thinking universal healthcare would be expensive considering all the trillions spent without blinking to pay for two pointless wars, the 1.7 trillions to be spent on a stealth plane that can't fly in the rain, and the trillions printed in the last couple of years and dumped on the stock market.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      To be fair, all three are expensive, and the returns/merits of each could be argued to varying degrees. If we adjusted the tax structure and spending to arrest or reverse the ever increasing debt, then it could be feasible. Personally, I'd like to see them start responsibly addressing the fiscal situation caused by their past decisions before adding in new programs.
    - legitster 5y ago
      Medicare for All would cost the combined equivalent of the entire wars in Iraq and Afghanistan... every 6 months. This talking point really undersells the order of magnitude difference in cost.
      - giantg2 5y ago
        The part that tends to be left out (maybe unaddressed or I'm uninformed) is, is there a single payer component to it like actual Medicare? In general, you spend several decades of your life working and paying in to collect for maybe a couple decades. And the more you make or pay in, the more coverage you have. So would we just end up with a government plan that we still need to pay premiums, deductibles, co-pays, etc on? And where are the systemic savings (providers still need to have billing agents to deal with this and private insurance, government overhead peobably isn't that much better than business overhead)? Do the people who can't afford it go on Medicaid to cover the balance like they do if they can't afford current Medicaid? Or are the suggestions really just misnamed and are totally different?
- jjoonathan 5y ago
  No, they think that covering something is better than covering nothing.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    I think that depends on exactly who you talk to. Quite a few people I've discussed this with believe it would be a complete replacement, even for employer based insurance. There a certainly some areas of interest to be address, like how to protect from bankruptcy even when someone has insurance, or what edge cases many of these uninsured people fit into that aren't covered by employers, the exchange, CHIP, Medicaid, and Medicare. Although in many discussions this is glossed over or not touched on at all. It would be interesting to see if requiring coverage for part time and contractors would affect anything. Especially if that would help pull people into the middle class (no idea if it would).
    - TMWNN 5y ago
      >There a certainly some areas of interest to be address, like how to protect from bankruptcy even when someone has insurance Only 4% of US bankruptcies are because of medical bills (<https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/03/26/the-truth-about-medical-bankruptcies/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/0...>). A tipoff that [insert large percentage here] of bankruptcies aren't actually because of medical costs is that only 6% of bankruptcies by those without health insurance are because of that cause. The biggest cause of bankruptcies is lack of income, which health insurance doesn't affect regardless of country.
      - giantg2 5y ago
        I agree that it's not a big issue, but it's certainly something I would like to see addressed. If I'm paying for protection from crushing costs by buying insurance, then I would hope that would protect me from any cost associated with lifesaving actions that would bankrupt me, and have tools to ensure the less urgent stuff is going to be covered. Of course sometime to comes down to people making medical coding issues on a bill. I've been dealing with that for 6 months now.
- TMWNN 5y ago
  >I guess the interesting part is that many of the people in the US want public healthcare and generally think that the international examples cover everything. In the US, the left assumes (and usually operates as per) that all healthcare plans outside the US are "100% free", single-payer like the UK NHS or Canadian Medicare, as opposed to the actual norm being something closer to that of France, Germany, Austria, or the Netherlands. France = 30% copay is the norm German/Switzerland/Netherlands = Everyone chooses from one of dozens of competing insurance plans. Basically Obamacare, except there are no loopholes like the ones that allow 9% of Americans to not get insurance Austria = Like US, but you don't get to choose the plan (no equivalent to US annual shopping period) Australia = Both private and public insurance. Those on public are strongly encouraged to move to private

giantg2 5y ago

That's fair. I guess the interesting part is that many of the people in the US want public healthcare and generally think that the international examples cover everything.

ChuckNorris89 5y ago
Like someone else here said it, universal healthcare isn't some magical talisman that makes all your health issues go away as long as you pay your taxes. Sure, if you have life threatening condition that needs to be addressed ASAP or else you'll die, you usually get taken care of without it ruining you financially like in the US would, but since the public system is massively understaffed and underfunded, then many health issues which are not life threatening but still impact your quality of life, can end up being out of packet, which sucks, as most Europeans aren't exactly rolling in disposable income (but at least they're not heavily in debt either). For example, in Austria, the amount of free care you get in case of an accident depend on where it happened. If it's at work, or on your way to/from work, then everything is fully covered, but if you get injured in your spare time, then only life threatening stuff is covered, for the rest, quality of life issues, you have to pay out of packet to have them fixed or have private accident insurance. Basically the public healthcare covers as little as to get you able-bodied to get back to work again, that's it. If you also want to feel 100% again, then you gotta pay up out of pocket. Since medical school is basically free, Austria has 3x the doctors per capita than the US, yet waiting times for specialists or some procedures are far longer. Why is that, you ask? Because most doctors here don't like being burned out in the understaffed public system, so once they served their "minimum sentence" in the public system to cover their "debt" for their public education, they go into private practice, which means that despite having 3x the doctors than the US, the public system is in a perpetual shortage of personnel. The state just doesn't have enough money to pay for every heath issue for everyone, but only the gravest of heath issues, and with our ageing population and stagnating economy, the situation is getting worse by the year. I heard Sweden, Finland and other rich EU countries have similar issues in their public system.
legitster 5y ago
This is a good reminder that people in the US have such a myopic view of our own issues. https://twitter.com/BadEconTakes/status/1228143455399858176 https://twitter.com/BadEconTakes/status/1228143455399858176 A better way to understand our problems is that our medicaid and medicare programs are the most generous in the world - so much so that extending it universally is so friggin expensive.
- ChuckNorris89 5y ago
  >so much so that extending it universally is so friggin expensive I laughed out loud at the idea of the US thinking universal healthcare would be expensive considering all the trillions spent without blinking to pay for two pointless wars, the 1.7 trillions to be spent on a stealth plane that can't fly in the rain, and the trillions printed in the last couple of years and dumped on the stock market.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    To be fair, all three are expensive, and the returns/merits of each could be argued to varying degrees. If we adjusted the tax structure and spending to arrest or reverse the ever increasing debt, then it could be feasible. Personally, I'd like to see them start responsibly addressing the fiscal situation caused by their past decisions before adding in new programs.
  - legitster 5y ago
    Medicare for All would cost the combined equivalent of the entire wars in Iraq and Afghanistan... every 6 months. This talking point really undersells the order of magnitude difference in cost.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      The part that tends to be left out (maybe unaddressed or I'm uninformed) is, is there a single payer component to it like actual Medicare? In general, you spend several decades of your life working and paying in to collect for maybe a couple decades. And the more you make or pay in, the more coverage you have. So would we just end up with a government plan that we still need to pay premiums, deductibles, co-pays, etc on? And where are the systemic savings (providers still need to have billing agents to deal with this and private insurance, government overhead peobably isn't that much better than business overhead)? Do the people who can't afford it go on Medicaid to cover the balance like they do if they can't afford current Medicaid? Or are the suggestions really just misnamed and are totally different?
jjoonathan 5y ago
No, they think that covering something is better than covering nothing.
- giantg2 5y ago
  I think that depends on exactly who you talk to. Quite a few people I've discussed this with believe it would be a complete replacement, even for employer based insurance. There a certainly some areas of interest to be address, like how to protect from bankruptcy even when someone has insurance, or what edge cases many of these uninsured people fit into that aren't covered by employers, the exchange, CHIP, Medicaid, and Medicare. Although in many discussions this is glossed over or not touched on at all. It would be interesting to see if requiring coverage for part time and contractors would affect anything. Especially if that would help pull people into the middle class (no idea if it would).
  - TMWNN 5y ago
    >There a certainly some areas of interest to be address, like how to protect from bankruptcy even when someone has insurance Only 4% of US bankruptcies are because of medical bills (<https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/03/26/the-truth-about-medical-bankruptcies/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/0...>). A tipoff that [insert large percentage here] of bankruptcies aren't actually because of medical costs is that only 6% of bankruptcies by those without health insurance are because of that cause. The biggest cause of bankruptcies is lack of income, which health insurance doesn't affect regardless of country.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      I agree that it's not a big issue, but it's certainly something I would like to see addressed. If I'm paying for protection from crushing costs by buying insurance, then I would hope that would protect me from any cost associated with lifesaving actions that would bankrupt me, and have tools to ensure the less urgent stuff is going to be covered. Of course sometime to comes down to people making medical coding issues on a bill. I've been dealing with that for 6 months now.
TMWNN 5y ago
>I guess the interesting part is that many of the people in the US want public healthcare and generally think that the international examples cover everything. In the US, the left assumes (and usually operates as per) that all healthcare plans outside the US are "100% free", single-payer like the UK NHS or Canadian Medicare, as opposed to the actual norm being something closer to that of France, Germany, Austria, or the Netherlands. France = 30% copay is the norm German/Switzerland/Netherlands = Everyone chooses from one of dozens of competing insurance plans. Basically Obamacare, except there are no loopholes like the ones that allow 9% of Americans to not get insurance Austria = Like US, but you don't get to choose the plan (no equivalent to US annual shopping period) Australia = Both private and public insurance. Those on public are strongly encouraged to move to private