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Why do people say only the rich can afford healthcare in the US?

W

WI Crippler

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Examples......
This was the response....
Yeah, assuming they're lucky, or otherwise rich.
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And another...
Well if they're rich enough they can get all that. If they're poor, they just die.
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You can certainly find similar sentiments in just about any healthcare thread. So my question is this, if 47 million Americans are to be considered to be uninsured (and I won't bother going into the breakdown of that, we'll just assume they are all citizens and tax payers or dependents of tax payers), then that means there is about 283 million Americans and/or dependents that are covered under some form of either private or government sponsored healthcare.

Are 85% of Americans "rich"?

How is it my wife and I are lower middle class with 2 kids, and we afford a healthcare plan while contributing to an HSA as well?
 


IN health care dollars I'm a millionaire. In disposable income I'm dead broke.

And I'm probably one of the few people that will spend all their health care dollars in their lifetime.
 
Merely having a health insurance plan does not mean that you're truly covered when it comes to serious illness.
 
Deuce said:
Merely having a health insurance plan does not mean that you're truly covered when it comes to serious illness.
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Yeah, I know a little bit about insurance and how it works since I was actually licensed in all lines of insurance. And I am a licensed healthcare provider, along with being a healthcare consumer. I pretty much have the major bases covered when it comes to experiencing how each aspect of the three party system of healthcare works.

Now can anybody explain how only the rich can afford healthcare, yet 85% of Americans have some sort of healthcare plan?
 

I think the motivation behind such statements is statistics like this Medical bills prompt more than 60 percent of U.S. bankruptcies - CNN

My interpretation of the statement is not that the rich can only afford healthcare but that the rich can afford a major medical problem and not have their life ruined by it. Given that the point of UHC is to make it so that high quality health care can be had by all, this perspective makes sense, even if the wording you cite is overly simplified.
 
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Medical bankruptcies won't change though, because sick people don't typically work when sick and they don't stop incurring consumer debt, before they're sick.
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
Medical bankruptcies won't change though, because sick people don't typically work when sick and they don't stop incurring consumer debt, before they're sick.
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Taking on debt while not working is obviously not good. However taking on debt + a 30k or 60k debt on top will push someone over the edge.
 
megaprogman said:
Taking on debt while not working is obviously not good. However taking on debt + a 30k or 60k debt on top will push someone over the edge.
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I'm talking about people who took on debt, while working and not being sick, then they become sick and are not working, while still having to pay the debt.

That is where a lot of the medical bankruptcies come from.
If I remember correctly, the data from that year showed that Canada had an equal or similar medical bankruptcy rate.

It's twisting data to fit an agenda or them coming to conclusions before thinking.
 

You are forgetting about the underinsured.

25 Million Americans Are 'Underinsured' - Drugs.com MedNews

And those who are covered by their employer.

Gallup: Number of people insured by their employer down 5.2%. Number insured by taxpayers up 3.5% « The IUSB Vision Weblog

So that translates to about 50 million of the richest Americans actually buy their own insurance.
 
Most people...even the 'poor' manage to get and pay for the things that are truly important to them...cell phones, smokes, alcohol, drugs, cable/satellite, video games, etc. But then, those things are seen as 'necessities.' It all comes down to 'priorities.'
 

I call bull**** on this. I work with genuinely poor people and they are more often than not living in homeless shelters and doing their best to get anything from medicine to food.

I challenge you to actually go work at a homeless shelter for day, talk to those people, and actually open your eyes to the real world.

People like you never step outside your own little world to see how the poorest in this country actually live so you have no basis by which to speak. You are just talking out of your ass.
 
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Call bull**** all you want. Go to any subsidized housing complex and then come talk to me.

You actually think you have a CLUE about my world? :lamo
 

Homeless shelter residents aren't the majority of low income people.

He's correct though, there is a disparity of priorities in the lower income classes.
 

I'm not sure I know how to explain this to you, but yes they get those things. But those things are easier to get, and require less foresight. And can be gotten when the cash is in hand.

It is more complicated than you make it, but I'm not sure we can education too much in this medium. There may be books written on this. Perhaps that would be something worth exploring.
 

:lamo at you for thinking you have the need to educate me or that I 'dont understand'. You and CT are comical in that you think you have the slightest clue of my world or day to day experiences.

But for the record...dood hangs out in homeless shelters...I work with medicare/medicaid recipients daily and have a staff of people that provide real opportunity and change. I know more about 'the poor' than you can fathom.
 

I have my own world experiences, which includes havng grown up quite poor. But, I speak to books written on this issue. It goes beyond life experiences, which sometimes is skewed by our mispreceptions.
 
VanceMack said:
Call bull**** all you want. Go to any subsidized housing complex and then come talk to me.

You actually think you have a CLUE about my world? :lamo
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Have you ever done any work with the homeless? Any at all? You don't know what you are talking about until you do.

But for the record...dood hangs out in homeless shelters...I work with medicare/medicaid recipients daily and have a staff of people that provide real opportunity and change. I know more about 'the poor' than you can fathom.
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People pay into medicare, so I don't know why you brought that up. So what is your beef with medicaid recipients?
 
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CriticalThought said:
Have you ever done any work with the homeless? Any at all? You don't know what you are talking about until you do.
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Again...it makes me laugh that you think you know my world. In a word? Yes.
 
VanceMack said:
Again...it makes me laugh that you think you know my world. In a word? Yes.
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Bull. For every poor parasite who games the system there are at least 5 people who genuinely need help. I doubt that you ever do any work with anyone truly poor.
 
CriticalThought said:
Bull. For every poor parasite who games the system there are at least 5 people who genuinely need help. I doubt that you ever do any work with anyone truly poor.
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Turn that statistic around and I'll accept that you are anything more than a CSW...at best. Oh...make no mistake...those 1-5 TRULY deserve the help and that is what the system is and SHOULD be for. Its the 4-5 that are sucking away from those that are truly in need and not just malingerers that 'got their bipolar' or any other of a handful of diagnosis thrown out by BHUs around the country that find it easier to prescribe and forget than actually do their job.
 
WI Crippler said:
...
How is it my wife and I are lower middle class with 2 kids, and we afford a healthcare plan while contributing to an HSA as well?
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Because you and your wife are obviously smarter than most people. I am assuming that you likely have a high deductable insurance plan and take advantage of the tax savings that such a plan allow when combined with an HSA.

Not everyone is as smart as you are.
 
What he of course ignores, is what he will be doing when the insurance company turn down his claim with some technicality or pre-existing condition claim and he must fork over oh let's say $300,000 for the treatment.

I'm sure he will have no problems whatsoever with forking over that amount of money, he is, after all, an American and we all know they are exceptional!
 

The emboldened part of your statement is the difference between your culture and my "UHC loving" or "socialized medicine" (American spelling of "socialised") society. I admired many things about Margaret Thatcher but one thing she got badly wrong here in the UK was trying to foster a belief that there was no such thing as "community" or "culture."

You are quite a different people and I respect that.

In your military you do however have the doctrine of "leave no-one behind" - it just doesn't apply to your country as a whole. I mean no insult - but those trying to denigrate countries that adopted UHC (example the British fear 'American-style' healthcare system thread) fail to understand the simple reasoning behind that.
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
That is where a lot of the medical bankruptcies come from.
If I remember correctly, the data from that year showed that Canada had an equal or similar medical bankruptcy rate.
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No....

The total bankruptcy rate in Canada is something like 1/4 - 1/3 of that of the U.S. Medical bankruptcy does not exist in UHC countries. Bankruptcy caused by ones inability to pay debts due to their health (especially if 100% of health care costs are paid) is probably the least likely way to get into a bankruptcy.
 
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