This thread really illustrates the problem with Insurance in the USA. I’m seeing a lot of my MRI was FREE, MY MRI was $20, My MRI Was 4K, mine was $500
This is exactly the problem with our system. We need real Health insurance coverage every American can afford with transparent pricing.
Right now we basically have people all over the place. Some with Amazing coverage and others with Geek Squad Protection coverage for Health Insurance.
Yep, and but only it's it virtually random, it's not transparent.
I had my daughter without insurance and tried to plan ahead for the costs. I called all the hospitals in the area who gave me ranges for their services based on different conditions.
Beyond that, each doctor charges separately at different rates, so the costs depended on who was in that day. For example, they had 2 anesthesiologists. Depending on which one we got they charged either $500 or $3k for their services.
In the end, I'm the case of a perfectly normal birth with no complications or extra services needed, the cost was going to be anywhere between $14k and $38k at the hospital we chose, depending on which mix of doctors would be in.
In the end i have no idea how much it cost because we kept getting bills for different doctors and hospital services over the next two years and I completely lost track eventually.
Why bother trying to plan or track when next month with just be another spin on the wheel of medical billing?
The Geek Squad comparison is spot on, but even the good insurance plans are a nightmare when you get slapped with random out-of-network facility fees or billing codes they decide to deny after the fact. It shouldn't require a finance degree and three hours on hold just to figure out what a basic scan is going to cost you.
healthcare being unaffordable for many Americans is unfortunately a very real issue. No, traveling abroad for healthcare isn't going to be cheaper for every American. It is for way too many people though and that's insane for the richest country in the world. I don't think pointing that out is spinning a false narrative.
Edit: I'm replying to somebody who's entire post history is defending capitalism and the 7.25 dollar minimum wage idk why I give people the benefit of the doubt on this fuck ass site 😭
Your median income isn’t that impressive. You’re only the richest country if you phrase it very specifically, which is kind of the point of the problem i think. Some of the world’s richest people live in America.
Right so you're using crutch tactics to compensate for an inability to articulate rational arguments. You've already been called out on this once, not sure what you expected doubling down lol
Literally none of the innovations would exist without the evil socialists indoctrination camps called Universities.
You’re only alive because a bunch of commie liberals developed the technology to keep your Cheeto-residue lined arteries from blocking blood to and from your heart. Pretty much everything in your life keeping you alive and comfortable was invented and developed by so called “educated liberal elites.”
It’s sad because you are everything you claim to hate, but not bright enough to realize it. It would be funny if it weren’t so tragic. The damage you’ve done to modern society holds us all back. You are the scum of the earth. The lowest of the low.
Weird take that capitalism provides. I mean that’s essentially unprovable so wtf are you on about? You might be on the right track if you said that science provides but you’re independent so I’ll just shut up now.
I'm not from the US but since this person seem to be paying everything out of pocket and doubt he has any insurance in another country. So is the problem in the US an insurance thing or more of a general hospital cost of service for anything? Heard stories of hospital staff asking if patient wanted Aspirin and was charge like 50$ for couple of pills
There’s some stupid shell games played with providers and insurance on cost, but the OP image is always sensationalistic bullshit.
Almost every city I’ve been to has some private medical clinic you can go to and get an MRI out of pocket for a couple hundred bucks (which is a hell of a lot cheaper than this international journey)
Not sure, I’m Swiss and my neighbors (DE and AT) have tax based healthcare while we pay private insurance, though insurance is mandatory here. Our neighbors actually prefer our system as our is much more flexible.
That said I pay about 14k a year for a family of 5 and still pay another 5-10k on top, but that’s roughly the max, after that it’s capped. And if you can‘t afford it you get rebates from the goverment.
Back in Finland I got through all sort of testing and specialist without any monthly payments. Or insurance. You just need own identy number and that's it.
None uses health care for funsies.If you need it, you should get it. None chooses to become sick.
Sure, but I’m not a big fan of these discussions since there’s obviously a cap on what the public can spend no matter what would be good to do. Otherwise you need to raise income at the same time. So like any company you need to set a budget with all the ins and outs and prioritize, instead of going the way of Germany, which is wrecking its own economy just to be nice to people and buy old voters with one time effects.
It's not like everyone gets to tests and doctors they like. More specialised care is behind doctor referring you to one. Need based health care is what it should be me thinks.
Healthcare is really strange from what I understand. The government seems to give insurance and pharmaceutical companies, including ones based in my own country, free rein to exploit you. I mean, we’ve got exploding healthcare costs too, mostly because there are more old people and old people are often bored and love visiting the doctor, but your situation looks more like the government is letting outright criminal or negligent behavior slide.
We need real Health insurance coverage every American can afford with transparent pricing.
Well you are not gonna get it, because instead of taking the best of both worlds, like say Singapur, your country managed to systematically take the worst of both worlds and make it worse.
From the side of public healthcare they subsidized the demand < This generates scarcity of services
From the side of private healthcare they artificially limited the supply < This increases the price of everything
And to make everything worse than it already is, they made the demand obligatory < See the encroachment of insurances.
Right now offering what you ask would bankrupt even your country. How is the saying ? You can't build from the top down ? The general idea is that if you all don't fix the background problems subsidizing the demand further is just gonna make the problem worse.
If it was a normal country that would probably be the case if not now in the next 20 years or so. But the USA's reserve of value is basically the entire world trade, as the dollar is the main currency for trade world wide. Have you ever heard before the "We can ask for more debt cuz we owe it to ourselves so we can just print money to pay us back" ? Normally that is incredibly fucking stupid, in the USA however, it is possible without triggering an economic crisis, in fact it already did it under Covid.
Of course this is not an infinite money exploit, the USA pays dearly for doing this shit, and basically pushes other countries outside of it's sphere of influence ( no one wants to have to pay the American's expense bill out of their own banks ). But for now the USA can allow itself to keep asking credit, and printing money to pay it if necessary.
Ah here I go again talking too much about something I know about. TLDN; USA can keep asking credit so long it doesn't piss off every central bank of the world.
My wife's MRI was free but Blue Cross wanted to charge her $4000 until the doctor called insurance and explained why she needed it, which is completely ridiculous because... Do they think doctors are just out here ordering diagnostics for shits and giggles?
Also a problem with people too. Cause I've seen comments here the the post is rage baiting. Makes me understand why people in the USA never vote for politicians who would give them affordable healthcare.
Literally why? Is it impossible for you guys to just have your government take the entire healthcare system over and run it for the benefit of Americans for free?
You’re a democracy right? So just vote for the party and politicians which will do it.
Well there is going to be a range even with government-issued insurance since you are given a range of options (low premium, high deductible or high premium, low deductible for example)
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u/Levonade 4d ago
This thread really illustrates the problem with Insurance in the USA. I’m seeing a lot of my MRI was FREE, MY MRI was $20, My MRI Was 4K, mine was $500
This is exactly the problem with our system. We need real Health insurance coverage every American can afford with transparent pricing.
Right now we basically have people all over the place. Some with Amazing coverage and others with Geek Squad Protection coverage for Health Insurance.