Who's gonna owe taxes this year?

[Golfman25]

But I don’t believe anyone should be denied health care because of personal circumstance that many a time an individual (children for instance) don’t have any control over.

That is my opinion. You’re of course free to disagree.

That's the rub. Nobody in the US is denied health care. Hospitals cannot turn you away. Many doctors eat a lot of uncollectable costs. Our problems are paying for health care. It's too expensive. Much of that expense is due to government interference, lack of cost/price transparency and legal issues.

 

[M Prod]

That's the rub. Nobody in the US is denied health care. Hospitals cannot turn you away. Many doctors eat a lot of uncollectable costs. Our problems are paying for health care. It's too expensive. Much of that expense is due to government interference, lack of cost/price transparency and legal issues.

I realize that, but that’s not how it’s designed or meant to work. And people do die in the US from lack of or flat out denial of coverage.

 

[CaptRonn]

I realize that, but that’s not how it’s designed or meant to work. And people do die in the US from lack of or flat out denial of coverage.

Really? The ACA specifies there is no denial of coverage.

 

[Golfman25]

Really? The ACA specifies there is no denial of coverage.

Yeah. You can't confuse health insurance coverage with healthcare. They are not the same.

 

[Krazzeeddie]

M Prod,

Slightly off topic but involves a question I have about mortgages in Canada. You see some of these home shows from Canada and they will have a young Canadian couple buying their first house and when asked what their budget is they say numbers in the upper 800’s to well over a million, and the house will only be a couple thousand square feet in size, so with taxes like are shown here how is housing that expensive and how do people afford housing like that.

Ed

 

[JVM225]

you're misinformed - a part C or advantage plan requires that you be enrolled in part B - the gov't then subsidizes the insurance company you choose - the result - a shittier network but with lower copays, ok if it suits your needs - but make no mistake, you still must pay for part B

You’re 100% right. Sorry, in my confusion, I had it mixed up.
I was going off a discussion I had recently with a friend who just turned 65 a few days ago and his primary residence is changing from NY to South Carolina as of tomorrow. He is getting a Part C policy at no additional cost, but although it will give him better benefits with little or no copayments, it will indeed be through either an HMO or PPO.

 

[Creekwood]

I think that’s a bit of an overstatement. Last year 52000 Canadians elected to have procedures done elsewhere (not just the US) and again ..these were strictly elective procedures and non life threatening. Only because they didn’t want to wait and could afford to do so. ..but not because the care is necessarily better elsewhere. You never have to wait in Canada for a potentially life saving treatment/procedure. You will also never be denied that procedure. The percentage of Canadians who again elected for optional treatments represents roughly .15% of the Canadian population. Conversely 2% of the US population gets their prescriptions from Canada (either in person or online) due to much higher prescription costs in the US.

I’ll add that life expectency in Canada beats out the US and infant mortality is less than half what it is in the US. These are important statistics when looking at the quality of health care anywhere.

In any case I’m not trying to make this into an us versus them discussion. When I lived in the US I had great health care ..but I also had a good job that afforded me that health care. I can’t say the same for many people who live in the US. Now I live in Canada, and I have great health care here too. And so does everyone else. I personally believe health care should be a basic human right and not a privilege. You may disagree and that’s fine. But I don’t believe anyone should be denied health care because of personal circumstance that many a time an individual (children for instance) don’t have any control over.

That is my opinion. You’re of course free to disagree.

Exactly. The only time we have ever sought US health care was when my wife was told that she likely had MS and that an MRI would likely provide a definitive diagnosis (but would not change anything). The MRI wait list for non-critical tests was a month or so (shorter if you want to take a stand by for cancellations). Understandably she wanted to know, so we drove to Rochester for a private MRI for $500. As it turns out, we would not have waited more than a week if we took the stand by option, which we did when she needed an MRI to sort out a chronic knee issue.

 

[JVM225]

Part of the reason people from the USS buy their drugs in other countries is not necessarily the price, but sometimes just the availability of the drugs.

This summer, while in France, we bought codeine tablets. The pharmacist told me "well, normally you're supposed to have a prescription."

When I questioned her about her use of the word "normally", she said it was not always the case. She asked me if I was in pain and I said I was having back pains and we were set to fly home in a day. She sold me a box of 40 codeine pills for about $12 IIRC. Those same pills in the US would absolutely require a prescription which meant a trip to the doctor ($$$$) and a high cost for the drugs.

My daughter did her Spring semester in Italy this past year and got sick (bronchitis/pneumonia) while she was there requiring a trip to the Doctor. She had to go to the Doctor one other time when her Asthma acted up.
The Doctor visits were covered through the school with the tuition and program fee, but the prescriptions he wrote both times weren’t. We were supposed to submit for reimbursement for those through our prescription plan at home.
I can’t remember the exact dollar amount they cost over there, but I remember that we were amazed at how cheap they were and that we didn’t bother submitting for the reimbursement when she got home because the cost was so low that it wasn’t worth the time for what we would have gotten back.
We’ve got a friend who is originally from Ireland. She goes back there several times a year to visit her family and she and her husband go to the dentist while there because they say it’s much cheaper.
Not sure why that is, or how the quality of the dentistry compares, but we’ve shared many meals with them over the years and I never saw them have to put the food through a blender first so I guess it’s okay.

 

[JVM225]

Hmmmm.........Maybe the answer is to move to a state with no income tax here in the US for a day over half a year each winter and spend the other half of each year in Canada where I can stock up on cheap drugs......
Considering the beautiful boating pictures some of the Canadian members post here, it’s pretty tempting......
Maybe I can smuggle boat parts north to pay for the second home........

 

[KevinC]

Exactly. The only time we have ever sought US health care was when my wife was told that she likely had MS and that an MRI would likely provide a definitive diagnosis (but would not change anything). The MRI wait list for non-critical tests was a month or so (shorter if you want to take a stand by for cancellations). Understandably she wanted to know, so we drove to Rochester for a private MRI for $500. As it turns out, we would not have waited more than a week if we took the stand by option, which we did when she needed an MRI to sort out a chronic knee issue.

First off I am not trying to start a fight with this statement but it may come off offensive. So here it goes... If we were stuck here in the USA with the same level of services you had in Canada then neither you nor MProd may have had an option to come to the US as our healthcare service wait times might have been even longer and even worse possibly not even available to you if it was government run. This goes to my point that when people want the best services without wait they will come to the US - this is not saying that good healthcare is not available in their countries but when they wish faster or better they still have the US as an option. Personally I am proud of the quality and the availability of services and tests - unfortunately this all comes with a price.

-Kevin

 

[JVM225]

In all seriousness, we need major healthcare/health insurance reform in this country. Nobody should ever be denied healthcare or prescription drugs or be bankrupted by it.
Seems like Trump had the right idea about erasing the state lines for shoppers looking for private policies, posting drug prices, and cutting FDA approval times while shortening patents, and while Obama had the right idea about everyone buying coverage, he got it wrong with the whole pre-existing conditions thing. Maybe those people need to go in to some kind of subsidized high risk pool or something.
There’s got to be a compromise in there somewhere that doesn’t involve socialized medicine for all.
Unfortunately, the politicians are involved and they’re not capable of working things out, and the American people keep sending the same a$$holes back to Washington, so things will stay screwed up for many years to come.

 

[JVM225]

First off I am not trying to start a fight with this statement but it may come off offensive. So here it goes... If we were stuck here in the USA with the same level of services you had in Canada then neither you nor MProd may have had an option to come to the US as our healthcare service wait times might have been even longer and even worse possibly not even available to you if it was government run. This goes to my point that when people want the best services without wait they will come to the US - this is not saying that good healthcare is not available in their countries but when they wish faster or better they still have the US as an option. Personally I am proud of the quality and the availability of services and tests - unfortunately this all comes with a price.

-Kevin

Kevin’s on the money with that.

 

[Chris340]

Bill & Jane live in Indiana in in a $300K house and earn $175K in income. Their property tax is approximately $3,000 per year, and their income tax is $6,000. They likely would not ever exceed $12,000 in state taxes paid.

In NY the income tax is double Indiana right off the bat and the property taxes I have heard of are unreal. You NY folks will know better, but I would expect a similar couple as above will pay $25,000-$35,000 a year in state taxes.

So when they do their federal taxes the Indiana couple write off $12K, the NY couple write off $30K and the result is the Federal take is less on the NY couple, and many filers do not care if their state is wasteful as they just write it off.

That has changed, no matter where you live, you can write off $10,000 of stater taxes. If your state charges more you still have to pay federal tax on anything over $10,000.

With this law no matter where you live you will pay similar tax federal tax for the same income.

MM

That's the rub. Nobody in the US is denied health care. Hospitals cannot turn you away. Many doctors eat a lot of uncollectable costs. Our problems are paying for health care. It's too expensive. Much of that expense is due to government interference, lack of cost/price transparency and legal issues.

The problem is, people without insurance wait to get treatment at a hospital, because doctors can refuse service without insurance. When they go to an emergency room, there is a huge bill, that the hospital spreads across all of the insured patients bills. The insured have always subsidized the uninsured. It's just more expensive without things like well checkups.... we saw how the unregulated industries worked, like in 2008.

 

[Gofirstclass]

Hmmmm.........Maybe the answer is to move to a state with no income tax here in the US for a day over half a year each winter and spend the other half of each year in Canada where I can stock up on cheap drugs.

Hmmmm, you just described Washington state. No income tax, some great boating here in the PNW, and close proximity to Canada for cheap drugs.