Decades ago, restaurant workers were paid "regular" wages, and got tips. A single mother could feed 3 kids AND buy a small house with those tips. Greedy restaurant owners hated the idea of their workers getting "money for nothing" (except busting their butts!) and changed the laws so the workers are paid obscenely low wages and then have to share their tips with EVERYONE employed at the restaurant whether they bust tail or not. It's disgusting. Especially because "tipping is optional", but those workers don't get their wages supplemented if diners don't tip!

Did you hear about Vatican???

Two things. 1) Citizens in most other developed countries don’t have to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket as Universal Healthcare provides. 2) Americans hospitals are businesses so they will try to charge more if they can.

In the UK you don’t pay at all. Thank God for the NHS.

Socialist Canadian here, thank you Canada for free health care and 100$ per year prescriptions since I am a senior! now if only dental was included!

US Healthcare Options in a nutshell: Option 1: get insurance. Pay so much, monthly, for insurance that you cant afford to actually get treatments or pay co-pays & therefore pay a lot for literally nothing... Option 2: dont get insurance. Get laughed out of every dr's office because they dont think you can pay (and you probably cant)... Option 3: go to ER. Pay 3x the amount (which you already cant afford) you would've if a reg dr had just treated you... Option 4: just suffer through it because you know you are the only one you gives a s**t about you & your health... I've ended at option 4 more times than i'd like to admit, regardless of what my insurance circumstances were.

Our preemie son's bill for his first three days in the NICU: over $10k. He went home almost 4 months later. 24 years later and he's still unaware we declared bankruptcy because we just couldn't keep up with bills 3 years later. Thanks to President Obama, he's still in our insurance while in college, and he can't be denied coverage for his many preexisting conditions. We still pay a pretty penny for his coverage, but we have no choice. He cannot afford to go without coverage (due to an average of 2-3 emergency brain surgeries per year). I would give anything for "socialist" health coverage.

Land of the freeeeeeeeeee cough cough

Oh, we know. And we're pretty pissed off about it!

I live in America and I most certainly do think it is expensive

wow all the comments here are downvoted...

Most inhabitants of civilised countries do not need medical insurance

I think that fact would fall in the category ‘fun, depressing facts’

We know it's a scam but our politicians are bought and paid for It's obvious in many ways. Oh this procedure is 500.00 cash. wait you have insurance? It costs 1500.00 but we negotiate with your insurance and they brought it down to 1000.00 You only have to pay half yourself...500.00 So you pay insurance and the cash price Of course if you were a politician then your healthcare would be free...go figure

and it is weird that they think their country is great, I mean help me out here please, why don't you guys do something about it? It is your right to have proper health care, your government is capable of and responsible for providing that. That is why you pay tax right?

A broken arm in other developed countries will cost you about 3000 dollar. (xray, setting, plaster) . I saw a US bill for a similarly broken arm.. 50.000 dollar. I don't think our nurses, doctors etc make less money. Machinery is the same.. So.. y'all are being screwed over..

We know this isn't normal. Stop assuming we're stupid. We're not stupid, our government is greedy and corrupt.

Yeap

Thank my lucky, lucky stars I'm from the UK.

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Thanks, Nixon

The bigger scam is all the people saying that healthcare is free, forgetting what taxes are. I'm not at all defending the US healthcare system but I do find it strange the amount of people saying their healthcare is free in other countries, when it isn't.

What most other countries do not understand about the US healthcare system is this: doctors and hospitals are sued constantly. Because of that, they must carry millions of dollars in malpractice insurance. Most of the costs for the doctors go to cover their insurance premiums. My SIL is a physician that doesn't perform surgery and her malpractice insurance premiums are about $40,000 per year.

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Actually, your insurance pays. Medical procedures are expensive.

If you've ever traveled outside the United States (and, sadly, only a small percentage have), you will quickly find out that the United States is not the greatest country in the world.

Right name, connections, or education and you can get through life with good money and almost no actual work.

It's working how it's supposed to, it just isn't designed to benefit the patient.

I love using the “...other countries manage it though?” argument on businesses. New Zealand has a terrible sick leave allowance so our progressive party poked Jacinda with a stick about it and she agreed to up it. She’s coddling the effing HELL out of the businesses but a bunch of them are still like “How are we supposed to survive if we give our employees a less pitiful amount of sick leave?!?!” And I’m like “the same way companies in other countries do it?”

Any job over minimum wage now requires a college degree. Even for an interview. The exceptions are few.

Employers like this fail with diminishing returns. Their employees are too exhausted to work efficiently, and unable to come up with good policies to increase efficiency. You end up with people doing four hours worth of work in a twelve hour day because they're just too broken for more.

Most harmful american myth.

Totally f****d up. Should be a blind trust. The way lawmakers sold off stocks and bought others after coronavirus briefings in February is disgusting. Looking at you Kelly Loeffler. Gross.

Right? Our obsession with exact time is just so weird.

Its literally only one party at the top of the heirachy, devided in two, to give you the illusion of having a choice

This is America in a nutshell. People who think hard work matters aren't being objective. The hardest workers make the fewest dollars, and they're desperately praying for the day when their "American Dream" finally begins. It's incredibly demoralizing.

Reagan messed up so many things, long term.

Highly recommend the Youtube channel "Ask a mortician" to learn more - Caitlyn Doughty there offers some great education and information (and fun, too!).