3 ms·

Just out of curiosity, what's your country of choice?

by udp 15y ago

acabal 15y ago
Germany. My girlfriend lives there, and besides being the powerhouse economy of the Eurozone at the moment, they seem to have more or less successfully blended a highly successful capitalist economy with realistic and humane social initiatives. To broadly generalize, the people here have a strong work ethic, are highly educated by average US standards, and take pride in what they do. They have a strong outdoors tradition and have highly progressive (again, by US standards) green-living initiatives. While I'm not yet that well educated in Germany politics and policies, my initial vague impression is that while they're not as big on certain civil rights as people ostensibly are in the States (open government censorship and sometimes discriminatory hiring practices, for example), neither do they have any illusions about those policies. If you do cross the law, punishments appear reasonable--not $3 million and a lifetime of bankruptcy and lawyers if you share 5 songs on Kazaa. Lots of other countries like to poke fun and point out the flaws in many of Germany's policies, and they certainly may be right, but Germany as viewed from the lens of a self-employed American engineer unable to get even basic health insurance is, at times, seemingly a progressive paradise.
- brndnhy 15y ago
  > a self-employed American engineer unable to get even basic health insurance Why is that?
  - acabal 15y ago
    Pre-existing conditions. I discussed this in a different thread long ago, but the long and short of it is that while I may qualify for a "car-crash emergency" type plan, it currently makes more financial sense for me to simply declare medical bankruptcy in case of emergency and pay small incidentals out of pocket than than pay a high premium/deductible on a plan that won't pay out unless I need tens/hundreds of thousands in care. Not to mention the risk of rescission. Meanwhile the COBRA payment from my last "real-job" employer was in the range of $400/month, which was not affordable for me.

Just out of curiosity, what's your country of choice?

by udp 15y ago

Just out of curiosity, what's your country of choice?

Germany. My girlfriend lives there, and besides being the powerhouse economy of the Eurozone at the moment, they seem to have more or less successfully blended a highly successful capitalist economy with realistic and humane social initiatives. To broadly generalize, the people here have a strong work ethic, are highly educated by average US standards, and take pride in what they do. They have a strong outdoors tradition and have highly progressive (again, by US standards) green-living initiatives. While I'm not yet that well educated in Germany politics and policies, my initial vague impression is that while they're not as big on certain civil rights as people ostensibly are in the States (open government censorship and sometimes discriminatory hiring practices, for example), neither do they have any illusions about those policies. If you do cross the law, punishments appear reasonable--not $3 million and a lifetime of bankruptcy and lawyers if you share 5 songs on Kazaa. Lots of other countries like to poke fun and point out the flaws in many of Germany's policies, and they certainly may be right, but Germany as viewed from the lens of a self-employed American engineer unable to get even basic health insurance is, at times, seemingly a progressive paradise.

brndnhy 15y ago
> a self-employed American engineer unable to get even basic health insurance Why is that?
- acabal 15y ago
  Pre-existing conditions. I discussed this in a different thread long ago, but the long and short of it is that while I may qualify for a "car-crash emergency" type plan, it currently makes more financial sense for me to simply declare medical bankruptcy in case of emergency and pay small incidentals out of pocket than than pay a high premium/deductible on a plan that won't pay out unless I need tens/hundreds of thousands in care. Not to mention the risk of rescission. Meanwhile the COBRA payment from my last "real-job" employer was in the range of $400/month, which was not affordable for me.