The kid's boyfriend got an ear infection. After suffering for several days, he went to a local walk-in clinic. The kid's boyfriend has health insurance (through his parents -- he's 21). With the health insurance, this walk-in appointment cost him $116 dollars. The medication for his ears, of course, had a co-pay.
The kid's boyfriend has a minimum wage job. (He has not been able to afford college,) So that's well more than he makes in a day.
For an earache.
Health care in this country is not accessible for a huge portion of the population.
5 comments:
In my state, $116 is two full eight-hour days at minimum wage. Furthermore, it is illegal for municipalities to set a minimum wage higher than federal law states.
How did Arkansas get a higher minimum wage?
Soundns as if Arkansas is not one of the states that has expanded access to Medicaid.
D Shannon -- Minimum wage here is $11.00/hour. The people voted that in a couple years ago. Arkansas is a red state, but we will occasionally do blue things! Even so, $11/hour is not nearly enough to live on -- my kid makes $13/hour, and between them he and the boyfriend can just barely afford a one bedroom apartment. They only have a car because my kid's grandfather gave him some money, and the boyfriend collected that government $$$ during the pandemic and held onto it (and even then it's a 15 year old car).
Anonymous: I think we did, actually. But the boyfriend has insurance, through his parents, so he's not on Medicaid.
When I gave birth, there was a complication with the placenta that put me at risk. I don't know how much it would have cost if it was an easier birth, but I still remember seeing a $20,000 hospital bill. We had insurance, but my guess is that one of people they pulled in during the emergency phase wasn't covered by my insurer.
We were lucky: I'm an aggressive saver and we were able to pay it. But that bill would've decimated a lot of families.
I don't think our present system works as well as it should.
I had two major medical events during my twenties and thirties -- thyroid cancer and a baby. For the second one, I had insurance. But yeah, it didn't matter. So many things weren't covered, we ended up having to declare bankruptcy just the same.
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