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Re:Googler... ex-Googler by weatherlite on Monday April 14, 2025 @07:39AM (#43680212)
West Europe is far from cheap. Housing, childcare etc is unaffordable for many in the middle class (and as dev, you are in most cases in Europe not a very high earner). Universal healthcare is the main (last) advantage Europe has over the U.S (and its a big one.)
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by kjkjadksj on Monday April 14, 2025 @12:40PM (#43683197)
If you can afford housing and child care in the US you don’t care about healthcare because you are probably on a good employee plan.
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by weatherlite on Monday April 14, 2025 @01:02PM (#43683425)
Jee sounds like a swell arrangement for 20% of the population ...
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by astrange on Monday April 14, 2025 @03:10PM (#43684969)
More like 80%. Americans are simply richer than Europeans.
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by int_19h on Monday April 14, 2025 @09:51PM (#43688244)
80% of Americans are definitely not on what I'd consider a "good healthcare plan".
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by signatoremo on Monday April 14, 2025 @10:42PM (#43688522)
What is considered a "good healthcare plan"? Can you compare American insurance plans with Europe's ones?

92% of American had health insurance in 2023. Some people may have more than one insurance plans, thus the total number below is greater than 100%.

Of the subtypes of health insurance coverage, employment-based insurance was the most common, covering 53.7 percent of the population for some or all of the calendar year, followed by Medicaid (18.9 percent), Medicare (18.9 percent), direct-purchase coverage (10.2 percent), TRICARE (2.6 percent), and VA and CHAMPVA coverage (1.0 percent).

https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2024/demo/p60-28...

Re:Googler... ex-Googler by int_19h on Monday April 14, 2025 @11:33PM (#43688756)
Dental coverage, for starters. It's surprising how many plans are extremely skimpy on this.
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by kjkjadksj on Tuesday April 15, 2025 @01:08PM (#43695653)
Does anyone actually have good dental insurance? I think mine just does a small copay when i clean but even before I had dental out of pocket for that is only like $70 every 6 months if you bother listening to dentist (most don’t after mom stops taking them up to having a bad tooth issue later in life). Any actual work done on my teeth even with insurance has been out of pocket because in the eyes of the insurance company, having functional teeth is a cosmetic matter. Extraction? Hope you have $2500 to pay an american dentist for that. Or you can get the exact same procedure done from someone with the same training and experience for about $700 if you drive or fly to Tijuana for it.
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by int_19h on Tuesday April 15, 2025 @04:40PM (#43698123)
US Big Tech healthcare plans do. I don't recall last time I had to pay anything out of pocket for dental cleaning, for example, and it's covered 4 times / year. I had root canal and wisdom teeth extraction too, and while those had some copay, it was nowhere near the numbers you quote.
Re:Googler... ex-Googler by astrange on Tuesday April 15, 2025 @06:18PM (#43699117)
Other countries don't do that either. IIRC the main reason for this is that dentistry was invented very recently and dentists are frequently just scammers who love unnecessary procedures.