Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:30 year mortgage I can understand. Employer based health plan as the only real option doesn't make any sense. No other developed country does this. We suck.

Socialized medicine has its issue. Try scheduling an MRI. It’s 6-29 weeks, depending on your provence.

A few years ago I had to wait over a month for an MRI, and finally, after months of being unable to walk properly, they recommended surgery. That was another 6 week wait. Please tell me how the US is better? I had a newborn at home and could barely walk him around, nevermind outside.

Anonymous wrote:One can just become a school bus driver if need a job. There are ton of them part time with year round medical.

The private HS near my house was offering $25 to $30 an hour to start. You do the rounds in morning, get a few hours off, then rounds in afternoon. Then you are off all summer and every school holiday.

That job gave medical, 401k, sick days etc.

A early retiree could easily do that job 55-65 and would cover medical and you still be putting into 401k and plenty of time to travel and enjoy life.

My Mom for awhile when we were little was the school lunch lady. My Dad was laid off, we had no medical, she worked 10 am to 2pm every day and got medical. Other than the hair net she liked being with the kids. She only did it one full school year.

it's sad that a 62 year old has to work as a bus driver or a cafeteria worker just to get medical care. Only in America.

One can just become a school bus driver if need a job. There are ton of them part time with year round medical.

The private HS near my house was offering $25 to $30 an hour to start. You do the rounds in morning, get a few hours off, then rounds in afternoon. Then you are off all summer and every school holiday.

That job gave medical, 401k, sick days etc.

A early retiree could easily do that job 55-65 and would cover medical and you still be putting into 401k and plenty of time to travel and enjoy life.

My Mom for awhile when we were little was the school lunch lady. My Dad was laid off, we had no medical, she worked 10 am to 2pm every day and got medical. Other than the hair net she liked being with the kids. She only did it one full school year.

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Universal health care is a separate issue from employer-sponsored health care. We could all be on the ACA and have a choice of the same range of health insurance companies. Then people wouldn't stay in crappy jobs just for the health care. Having the ACA for all Americans would promote entrepreneurship and continue to prop up the health insurance industry.

I'm not a politician or an expert in health care, but I think that's the way to go in the US.[/quote]

I agree. I understand that historically employers wanted to be able to entice good workers and one way to do that was to differentiate benefits. Over time, it became the norm to offer health care as a benefit. Why can't the employers ear mark the funds they would spend on healthcare per employee and allocate the money to the employee to spend on the ACA. Money would be payable directly to the exchange, the employee would not be able to take the money and use it for something else.

Employees would still receive employer subsidized healthcare but it would no longer be tied to your job. [/quote]

The problem with this setup is that it still stifles employment flexibility. If employers are still on the hook for a certain amount of subsidy for each employee, that increases the cost of each employee and stifles hiring and reduced or part time schedules. Rather than a set amount, it could be calculated as a percentage of their hourly wage or salary, remitted to a fund the same way FICA is, and then the employee’s insurance receives the subsidy.

Since AI and the gig economy are here to stay, flexibility is everything. It is better for society to have 500 people employed 32 hours a week or on a lower full time salary than 400 people at 40 hours a week with 100 unemployed.
In order to keep people employed, the cost of hiring and keeping employees needs to be reasonable.

I think about this especially with my kids who will be going to college and becoming adults soon. My kids are not stupid or lazy, but the employment landscape looks scary.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Policy-wise those are very different questions.

30-year mortgages evolved as a way to help people afford housing. More recently, Trump proposed 50-year mortgages, which are common in some other countries.

Employer-provided health care is frequently debated as part of discussions about moving to single-payer. It’s a complicated subject. It does shackle people to jobs they don’t like and stifles entrepreneurship but it sustains the insurance industry and keeps government at bay on healthcare, which some like for some stupid reason.

+1. I’m all for universal health care in theory, but in practice (in other countries) it seems far from perfect. My grandparents are Canadian and when my elderly grandfather was having a breathing emergency, the wait for an ambulance (yes there are WAITS for ambulances in Canada) was over 2 hours. So my elderly, mobily challenged grandfather had to get to the hospital on his own without medical care (nearby relative met him at the hospital). He ended up having a heart attack at the emergency room and dying. The systems and waits to get into treatment in universal healthcare systems can be really terrible.

Have you ever dealt with an insurance company? I'd MUCH prefer dealing with the government than an insurance company. This isn't even a question.

Can't sue the government. People die waiting in line.

Anonymous wrote:Why do we have a system that promotes 30 years mortgages and employer-based healthcare, when people who unfortunately involuntary lose their job by 50 are pretty much done?

The massive confidence that the future will always be a reflection of the past (ie market has always done well, so don't worry) pretty much means that you have to hope that between the ages of 22 and 49 this assumption of forever market return of 6%+ on average holds true. So you pretty much have 27 to make sure you meet all life goals and save for retirement in an inflationary environment.

It's always been the same for me since the 80s. You need two people working and you buy a house you can afford. Scrimp and save by doing without for retirement. Kids go to to public college

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Policy-wise those are very different questions.

30-year mortgages evolved as a way to help people afford housing. More recently, Trump proposed 50-year mortgages, which are common in some other countries.

Employer-provided health care is frequently debated as part of discussions about moving to single-payer. It’s a complicated subject. It does shackle people to jobs they don’t like and stifles entrepreneurship but it sustains the insurance industry and keeps government at bay on healthcare, which some like for some stupid reason.

+1. I’m all for universal health care in theory, but in practice (in other countries) it seems far from perfect. My grandparents are Canadian and when my elderly grandfather was having a breathing emergency, the wait for an ambulance (yes there are WAITS for ambulances in Canada) was over 2 hours. So my elderly, mobily challenged grandfather had to get to the hospital on his own without medical care (nearby relative met him at the hospital). He ended up having a heart attack at the emergency room and dying. The systems and waits to get into treatment in universal healthcare systems can be really terrible.

Have you ever dealt with an insurance company? I'd MUCH prefer dealing with the government than an insurance company. This isn't even a question.

PP's point is that the grandfather died.

Anonymous wrote:Universal health care is a separate issue from employer-sponsored health care. We could all be on the ACA and have a choice of the same range of health insurance companies. Then people wouldn't stay in crappy jobs just for the health care. Having the ACA for all Americans would promote entrepreneurship and continue to prop up the health insurance industry.

I'm not a politician or an expert in health care, but I think that's the way to go in the US.

Just understand that "universal health care" and "single-payer" are not interchangeable terms. Single-payer health care is universal. But you can have universal health care with private health insurance, too -- that was the aim of the ACA.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:30 year mortgage I can understand. Employer based health plan as the only real option doesn't make any sense. No other developed country does this. We suck.

Socialized medicine has its issue. Try scheduling an MRI. It’s 6-29 weeks, depending on your provence.

I take it you've never tried to get a doctor's appointment here in the states and been told the first time they could get you in is three months from now? Happens ALL the time. This isn't a "socialized medicine" problem.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Policy-wise those are very different questions.

30-year mortgages evolved as a way to help people afford housing. More recently, Trump proposed 50-year mortgages, which are common in some other countries.

Employer-provided health care is frequently debated as part of discussions about moving to single-payer. It’s a complicated subject. It does shackle people to jobs they don’t like and stifles entrepreneurship but it sustains the insurance industry and keeps government at bay on healthcare, which some like for some stupid reason.

+1. I’m all for universal health care in theory, but in practice (in other countries) it seems far from perfect. My grandparents are Canadian and when my elderly grandfather was having a breathing emergency, the wait for an ambulance (yes there are WAITS for ambulances in Canada) was over 2 hours. So my elderly, mobily challenged grandfather had to get to the hospital on his own without medical care (nearby relative met him at the hospital). He ended up having a heart attack at the emergency room and dying. The systems and waits to get into treatment in universal healthcare systems can be really terrible.

Have you ever dealt with an insurance company? I'd MUCH prefer dealing with the government than an insurance company. This isn't even a question.

Anonymous wrote:Why do we have a system that promotes 30 years mortgages and employer-based healthcare, when people who unfortunately involuntary lose their job by 50 are pretty much done?

The massive confidence that the future will always be a reflection of the past (ie market has always done well, so don't worry) pretty much means that you have to hope that between the ages of 22 and 49 this assumption of forever market return of 6%+ on average holds true. So you pretty much have 27 to make sure you meet all life goals and save for retirement in an inflationary environment.

why woud someone be done at 50 you can work at walmart

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:30 year mortgage I can understand. Employer based health plan as the only real option doesn't make any sense. No other developed country does this. We suck.

Socialized medicine has its issue. Try scheduling an MRI. It’s 6-29 weeks, depending on your provence.

So, it's better to have a system where millions can't afford healthcare because you don't want to wait to get an MRI?

No system is perfect, but I bet you if you asked those people who live in that province if they'd rather have US type healthcare, they'd balk. I certainly know the British would. My British ILs think our system is nuts. My Canadian coworker thinks the same. They may complain about their healthcare, but they'd rather have theirs than ours.

Anonymous wrote:30 year mortgage I can understand. Employer based health plan as the only real option doesn't make any sense. No other developed country does this. We suck.

Socialized medicine has its issue. Try scheduling an MRI. It’s 6-29 weeks, depending on your provence.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:More recently, Trump proposed 50-year mortgages, which are common in some other countries.

In which countries are 50-year mortgages "common"? This seems like one of those situations where people seize on a dumb idea to try to sanewash it but once you actually dig into the example 'other countries', it doesn't hold up.

For the record, 30-year mortgages ARE uncommon in most other countries - the long, long mortgage term is a US thing. But sure, let's nearly double those unusually long mortgages.

You can always Google. Japan. Other counties like the UK, Switzerland, France and Finland apparently offer 50 year mortgages.

Most Western countries have 25 to 30 years as average mortgage duration. And in countries like the UK rates can be commonly floating/variable, not fixed, which is why they have bouts of foreclosure crises when rates shoot up. You can find this out by googling easily.

Anonymous wrote:For our family. we are sticking w jobs we don't love / limited growth due to healthcare. Counting down the days until retirement eligible (less than 180) so that we have the coverage we need to support our family.

ACA - if implemented as written - would have opened up a lot of options but since our government needed to weaponize accomplishments of people with darker skin colors, we are where we are.

I'm not doubting it. But would you please explain what you imply ? I'm curious since the unknown people that ran the Biden white house made everything about POC