pretty much

[orca@orcas.enjoying.yachts]

I broke my wrist at the start of 2023 and the bill to me after insurance was $6k lol. I saw the bill the doctor submitted to insurance and it was $40k. The ambulance bill came in separately at around $800.

[stinky@redlemmy.com]

I'm tired of fighting my own people when I say we shouldn't be in chains

[dis_honestfamiliar@lemmy.sdf.org]

Damn. This a little meme reminder that any savings i have towards retirement could disappear in an instant.

[dufkm@lemmy.world]

I first read it as "mechanical debt" (probably because of the gear-shaped figure), and had an existential crisis for a few milliseconds. I need to take my car to the shop as soon as I can afford it.

[vastard@lemmynsfw.com]

Now imagine if instead of paying a private corporation for the privilege of a deductible against a maximum coverage amount you instead paid a bit more income tax in exchange for free healthcare no matter how many times you needed it.

Based on other countries’ models the tax difference would have been less than $6k in all but the highest income brackets.

[stinky@redlemmy.com]

That system sounds measurably better in every way

[vastard@lemmynsfw.com]

Unless you’re filthy rich enough not to care. Then you can pay your media outlets to manufacture rugged individualism and paint any common-good policy with the broad brush of communism.

Last year I went in for an organ removal: $0.
The hospital bill for my child’s birth: $0.
Regular quarterly family doctor visits for routing monitoring: $0.

The comments from Americans who move abroad to other countries and experience the healthcare of other developed nations is eye-opening. I truly hope people find the means to demand a better base level of care and join the rest of the modern world.

[stinky@redlemmy.com]

many of us lose our homes trying to pay off medical debt, or die in waiting rooms of emergency clinics

it's not like we're being smug and superior about our healthcare system lol it's really, really painful for most of us

comparison with other countries IS eye-opening but invariably leads to hostility toward Americans ("'murica", school shooting references, etc) and it's made a lot of us angry. we can't help but be suspicious of comments like your last sentence because it has the potential to be abusive in nature, not helpful, and we've learned from past experience that there's a non-zero chance it was meant to be.

but anyway yeah, I hope someday I find the means to demand a better base level of care

[pregnenolone@lemmy.world]

Yeah but Luigi has a gun

[vastard@lemmynsfw.com]

It was definitely not meant to be mean-spirited. A rising tide should lift us all. Selfishly, I imagine the good a few hundred million people could do for the rest of the world if suddenly freed from these sort of unnecessary financial and social hardships.

[nanoswarm9k@lemmus.org]

New thread but yeah. Also the answer will be trains.
I have never been able to afford a car repair. I just cut meals and get chronic health issues. See? It comes back around. The systemic misdirection of work and worth cascades into general disrepair of the working and subjugated classes.

I had a funny dream everyone was on ubi, and grease monkeys just hung around the public garages hoping someone comes by with a problem or a question. Also there were fruit trees in the park.
Something else is possible while we still have some resources.