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Lost sheep. I wasn’t meaning to be degrading Medicare and those who have it. It’s earned because of age in our country and it’s not free but it’s not $2,000 dollars a month for coverage with a $1,500 dollar deductible, $8,000 out of pocket a year and 80/20 coverage. I just was referring to the fact I didn’t want to wish my life away, again. It happens on its own.

Lost sheep. I wasn’t meaning to be degrading Medicare and those who have it. It’s earned because of age in our country and it’s not free but it’s not $2,000 dollars a month for coverage with a $1,500 dollar deductible, $8,000 out of pocket a year and 80/20 coverage. I just was referring to the fact I didn’t want to wish my life away, again. It happens on its own.

Ronn1708 wrote:Lost sheep. I wasn’t meaning to be degrading Medicare and those who have it. It’s earned because of age in our country and it’s not free but it’s not $2,000 dollars a month for coverage with a $1,500 dollar deductible, $8,000 out of pocket a year and 80/20 coverage. I just was referring to the fact I didn’t want to wish my life away, again. It happens on its own.

No problem. There was, a couple years ago, some debate over which country had the best health care systems, or most logical, or most effective or efficient. There was some provinciality expressed (with a little bit of vehemence).

There is a lot that could be improved in (I think) every countries' health care systems. Probably the only perfect system is just to never get sick or injured.

You guy are forgetting that Medicare is funded by a payroll tax on working Americans. Sure, it isn't $1,500 a month at 65. But paying the premiums for 47 years sure adds up. I seem to recall that it is a little over 6% of your gross wages. I paid a lot for this "free" Medicare.
Last I read the median household income across the USA was in the low 50's. So it sure looks to me like working people are paying in excess of $3,000 a year for their working lives to fund "free" Medicare for those that live to 65.
I will pay even more by having a supplemental policy to cover what Medicare doesn't. Also, it is my understanding that the Medicare reserves makes Social Security look very well funded.
Nothing is free. Just because they didn't send you a bill. Only means they got it from you somehow else.

Again let me say I was not trying to offend anyone about Medicare. I am paying the 6% and the insurance premiums. I was just saying I wasn't wishing my life away again like I had when I was younger. I hope to get the benefit I have help pay for in just a few years too! I started this post asking for insight into what the possible last cost might be from me after the insurance kicked in on this huge bill. It also seems that the prices charged in the beginning would somehow be closer to the prices to be paid. I mean the imagining company charged me half what they were going to charge my insurance. Now if anyone can show me how that adds up I am open ears. PLEASE forget I even mentioned Medicare and the word Free. I only referred to that about not wishing my life away. My Bad. My apology if I offended anyone totally was not my intent .

No offense taken here. Hey, my mother in law was convinced that her social security was "interest" on the few years that she worked as a janitor. It was really based upon her third husbands long career working at a smelter.
As for the final price of medical procedures. I've posted several times about hidden proprietary discounts. Nobody can break those "business secrets".
Maybe 10 years ago. I read about a journalist hat took on a story to figure out just how much a brothers surgery cost the insurance company. After wading through the morass of bills & statements. The project was abandoned.
EDIT. I don't have a huge problem with several of our social programs. Except for shaky funding & over promising results. Both are designed to sell poorly thought out programs.

Gt1956 wrote:You guy are forgetting that Medicare is funded by a payroll tax on working Americans. Sure, it isn't $1,500 a month at 65. But paying the premiums for 47 years sure adds up. I seem to recall that it is a little over 6% of your gross wages. I paid a lot for this "free" Medicare.
Last I read the median household income across the USA was in the low 50's. So it sure looks to me like working people are paying in excess of $3,000 a year for their working lives to fund "free" Medicare for those that live to 65.
I will pay even more by having a supplemental policy to cover what Medicare doesn't. Also, it is my understanding that the Medicare reserves makes Social Security look very well funded.
Nothing is free. Just because they didn't send you a bill. Only means they got it from you somehow else.

Medicare costs 2.9% of your entire income. Say a guy Gets successful and makes $300,000 a year at 30 yrs old. He pays into medicare, $9,000 a year for 35 years. That is $274,000 dollars. Say he sets up a good 401k that pays him $300,000 a year. HE MAKES TOO MUCH MONEY now to be eligible for Medicare. Dang, we need to tax them rich guys more. Back to the subject,,, my Medicare just paid $29,000 for my artificial urinary stpincher.

I pay my own health insurance. Costs me about $1200.00 a month for just me with a 1500 deductible and 3500 (goes to 4500 next year) max out of pocket. I had meet my out of pocket for this year and went to the ER to have something checked as directed by my primary care doctor. I never received a bill from the hospital. But my BCBS EOB was this: Total charges 7900.00 Provider (hospital) Contractual Write-off 6194.99 Amount Paid (by BCBS) 1753.36 Total Patient Responsibility 1.65 I guess it cost more to bill and collect $1.65 as I have not received anything or it takes a long time to do so. I hope this helps and answers the original posters a bit. So relax and wait. Over 10 years a go I had a wound that was infected and when I went in to get some antibiotics for it I was sent to the hospital and spent 5 days and had a short surgery. My responsibility was over 2k and while I could have paid it all after everything was said and done the hospital gave me an option to make payments with no additional fees or charges. So I took them up on it. So no need to worry now about something that you don't have the all the information on. If you do end up owing more than you feel comfortable paying all at once call and ask about payments. Almost 3 years ago when I was checking locally for this, my uro's business office wanted to process everything ahead time and wanted money up front before surgery. But that was a long time ago and states very as do health care providers. Take care and work on healing and think about all the fun you are going to have with your implant.

oldbeek wrote:

Gt1956 wrote:You guy are forgetting that Medicare is funded by a payroll tax on working Americans. Sure, it isn't $1,500 a month at 65. But paying the premiums for 47 years sure adds up. I seem to recall that it is a little over 6% of your gross wages. I paid a lot for this "free" Medicare.
Last I read the median household income across the USA was in the low 50's. So it sure looks to me like working people are paying in excess of $3,000 a year for their working lives to fund "free" Medicare for those that live to 65.
I will pay even more by having a supplemental policy to cover what Medicare doesn't. Also, it is my understanding that the Medicare reserves makes Social Security look very well funded.
Nothing is free. Just because they didn't send you a bill. Only means they got it from you somehow else.

Medicare costs 2.9% of your entire income. Say a guy Gets successful and makes $300,000 a year at 30 yrs old. He pays into medicare, $9,000 a year for 35 years. That is $274,000 dollars. Say he sets up a good 401k that pays him $300,000 a year. HE MAKES TOO MUCH MONEY now to be eligible for Medicare. Dang, we need to tax them rich guys more. Back to the subject,,, my Medicare just paid $29,000 for my artificial urinary stpincher.

I can be wrong in the Medicare portion on my old pay statements. I think 2 programs were rolled into 1 figure in that column. But I think your point is well taken. Tax someone high then deny them benefits.
I'm not an advocate for any grand healthcare program until we can figure out how to deliver healthcare at a more reasonable price. To get the program first seems to only guarantee they they'll keep coming back for more money over true reforms.
We had an adult child that we had to navigate deperssion healthcare needs out of our own pocket. It was hard journey.

Well the insurance paid that claim $27k. Had another surgery today because of some problems with stitches and cylinder breaking through. So I figure the I insurance company will want to make sure my burial insurance is paid up. Lol cause they going to want me to kick the bucket. Lol