[tombert]

About ten years ago, my wife had to get her gallbladder removed; they had a bill of $75,000. Her family was very poor, didn't have insurance, and they similarly made an ultimatum of "you can either get nothing from us, or you can get $5000", which the hospital accepted. $5000 was of course still a struggle, but how absurd is it that they were effectively doing a 1500% markup for a life-saving procedure?

If they hadn't known about this trick, there's a good chance that her family would have had to declare bankruptcy to pay for this, which of course means that the taxpayers are stuck footing the full bill.

[mixmastamyk]

Well, they took some amount that covered their costs. It's not clear they made a profit or not. They know some will not pay and pass the cost onto the rest of us.

[tombert]

Fair enough; I guess I would just be happier if we had an NHS-style system where taxes just cover everyone. The reason my wife had serious gallbladder issues was because she didn't go to the doctor to get it treated when she first started showing symptoms (because she couldn't afford it), and then had to go to the emergency room.

Anyway, I get that they pass the costs onto the rich people and/or the insurance companies to cover the people that aren't paying, but it's still depressing, since a lot of people don't know that you can "haggle".