47% Of Americans Can't Even Come Up With $400 To Cover An Emergency Room Visit

zero hedge ^ | 4/21/16 | tyler durden

[Nachum]

If you had to make a sudden visit to the emergency room, would you have enough money to pay for it without selling something or borrowing the funds from somewhere?

Most Americans may not realize this, but this is something that the Federal Reserve has actually been tracking for several years now. And according to the Fed, an astounding 47 percent of all Americans could not come up with $400 to pay for an emergency room visit without borrowing it or selling something.

Various surveys that I have talked about in the past have found that more than 60 percent of all Americans are living to paycheck to paycheck, but I didn’t realize that things were quite this bad for about half the country. If you can’t even come up with $400 for an unexpected emergency room visit, then you are just surviving from month to month by the skin of your teeth. Unfortunately, about half of us are currently in that situation.

Earlier today someone pointed me toward an excellent article in The Atlantic that discussed this, and I have to admit that The Atlantic is one of the last remaining bastions of old school excellence in journalism that you will find in the mainstream media. Of course I don’t see eye to eye with them on a lot of things philosophically, but there are some really hard working journalists over there.

The article where I found the 47 percent figure comes from The Atlantic, and it is entitled “The Secret Shame of Middle-Class Americans“. It was authored by Neal Gabler, and he says that he can identify with the 47 percent of Americans that don’t have $400 for an unexpected emergency room visit because he is one of them…

[Gamecock]

Some ERs can't even handle an overdose of cheap envelope glue.

[Graybeard58]

Tell me where you can find an ER and a 400 buck visit

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Exactly! My 17 year old daughter had an E.R. visit about a month ago and it was over $1600. Fortunately my insurance paid all but my $50 co pay.

[GoKnow]

I’m hard-pressed to understand where you live that you had to pay $1500 for an ER visit. Are you including treatment in that amount with no insurance coverage?

I’m a Medicare insurance agent in Florida. ER co-pays for HMO or PPO Advantage plans run $40 to $50 respectively. Where does the author come up with $400 for a visit?

[GOPJ]

What all of these numbers tell us is that the middle class is disappearing. I tend to compare it to a game of really bizarre musical chairs. With each passing month more chairs are being pulled out of the circle, and those members of the middle class that haven’t fallen into poverty yet are just hoping that a chair will still be there for them when the music stops.

Hillary's plan is to bring in another 20 million illegals who will vote Democrat - demanding MORE STUFF... from fewer American workers.

[moovova]

$400 for an ER visit? Right...howz about $4000.

And that’s just for the parking.

[bravo whiskey]

we are semi retired and not rich by any means but i have that much in emergency cash in my backup wallet.

[Busta Rhymes]

My last ER visit my husband was chased from room to room as I was being moved around, by a clip board woman asking can you satisfy this bill today ? If I remember correctly, the initial walk in room cost was a $100, second room was $100 and the third room was $50. The woman looked like a starving beast waiting for some meat. LOL. All true.

The writer of the piece

The Secret Shame of Middle-Class Americans

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/05/my-secret-shame/476415/

lived like a stupid moonbat. He should be ashamed.

[rdcbn]

Yeah

The private party self pay for an emergency room visit was like $5000.00 But the insurance charge was $800.00

[Michael.SF.]

47% of Americans are bums? How many are RAT voters? All?

All? That would be 100%. You underestimate, I'd say 125-130% of them vote D.

[hoosierham]

$400 was the deductible to be met each year BEFORE my much-missed pre-obamacare policy was cancelled by the Democrats.

So the first ER visit cost $400.

Except I only had one ER visit in about 15 years.

[gg188]

I read the article and while it presented examples of disturbing stories of good people in financial distress, the author, who also says he cannot afford a $400 emergency, lives at a level of opulence that we in flyover country, outside of NYC and San Fran, cannot even dream of or imagine. And the author's decisions in life, the bad ones which he admits put him in the position he's in, were decisions made to maintain an incredibly opulent lifestyle---compared to most people, to ordinary people---including his own risky (and ultimately losing) gamble at pursing his own personal career choice which clearly was not adequate, and for most in such a career path I would bet it also would never be adequate?

It's still very interesting reading despite the guy giving himself away when he refers to "undocumented workers" LOL instead of illegal aliens, and basically taking the opportunity to use a paragraph to villify Trump, without naming him by name. (Liberals cannot resist in any conversation, missive, post, ANYTHING, to not assert their personal politically correct and, in their opinion, inarguably accurate comment.

[BunnySlippers]

We have been importing poor people for decades to modify both parties. No wonder no one pays taxes!

[roadcat]

I went to Walgreens and got $20 worth of supplies. Fixed it up myself

Smart, you are. Last year I got bit on my thumb by a feral cat. Concerned about germs, I went the the Emergency room at the local hospital. All I wanted was a tetanus shot. I waited four hours in a waiting room with half a dozen other people before someone would look at my thumb. They asked me to wash and rinse it (something I could do at home), had me lay on a bed waiting another hour before someone else came to give me a shot, and gave me a prescription for drugs. Only real work done was a ten-second shot. My insurance took care of most of an expensive bill, which I got the runaround on for four months of paperwork before it was paid. All for a stupid little bite. Next time, it's Walgreens for supplies! Money-grubbing hospitals!

[cherry]

people work and save and try to watch expenses...but even then, they may not make it....too many taxes, and fees, and insurance, and now the price of food.....

then there are people who "associate" with the upper tiers of society and wiggle they're way into "deals" and "opportunities" etc not available to the working stiffs....

that is why most of them are rich or stay rich....the inner deals they make....like Pelosi and Feinstein..

I have no use for the lazy or the drug addled, but I do have a heart for those trying in this economy and keep getting kicked in the teeth.....

[Bob434]

that would mean missing a payment on their large screen OLED or Plasma TV - or a missed payment on their brand spankin new suburban truck- or a payment on their inground pool- or or or

[Dirt for sale]

It is because they are programmed to spend rather than to save, to feed wants rather than needs, and so to live a circular life, working to live and living to work.

[KitJ]

$400?

The last ER visit I had was $800 to be seen, and another $1200 or so for tests. Over $2k in charges for Mrs. Kit’s visit.
***
On another note, I cut my hand pretty badly in the shop last year. I got out the big first aid kit and decided it was time for some training.

In the end, college-age daughter #1 learned how to irrigate and put some sutures in, then bandage at the end. She did great, and I avoided sitting in an emergency room for several hours with people who had a cough but no money.

I’m really proud of her for that. The hand healed up fine.

I did spot her a stitch or two to show how the knots go, then the rest was hers.

Oh. Painkillers? I had two shots of whiskey for when the pliers pulled the needle through, then a few aspirin for the next couple days.

[Mark was here]

Why don’t they just..... charge it?

Isn’t that what everyone does these days?

Isn't that called borrowing the money, part of what the "poor" 47% do?

I have always had health insurance so I have never been asked to pay for an emergency room visit. The hospitals up the charges to insured patients, to pay for uninsured patients. This is really a government mandated tax, because of regulations demanding all patients get treated.

[wintertime]

that more than 60 percent of all Americans are living to paycheck to paycheck,
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Well.....Every time I go to a 7-11 there are people ahead of me buying lottery tickets and cigarettes. If people are living paycheck to paycheck maybe we could start there.

I bet with Dave Ramsey’s principles most of that 60% would not be living paycheck to paycheck.

[Pearls Before Swine]

The 400 bucks is for t&e the deductible, assuing you have insurance.