Vnac's comments

Yeah, as I mentioned, the calculation is a bit different when people have kids. And that's great, but for me it's unaffordable and cheaper to fly back to the US whenever I need to go to a doctor or refill prescriptions and keep insurance in the US. And that's absurd. It works pretty well though, but that may become unworkable too with the changes to the US system.

By pay double, I mean that I would have to pay the employers half as well. And on top of that, most public insurance companies seem to have a minimum amount of money that they assume freelancers make, which is often above what I actually make. So health insurance would come out to be 1/3 of my income pre-tax a lot of the time.

There does seem to be some preventative care for older people, but a lot of the stuff my doctors check at yearly visits in the US (basic exams, blood tests, even getting a free yearly checkup at all) doesn't seem to be covered at all if you are under a certain age. There's a lot of nice things about the US system under Obama that I took for granted. Certainly isn't perfect or better in all situations, but there are some areas where it seems significantly better than the system in Germany. So I'm always surprised when I see Americans talking about how great the German system is and treating it like an ideal. It seems like it's good in some situations, but the US system is better in many situations too.

I've heard that care is quite good when people end up in a hospital (and people seem to be kept in the hospital much longer and more easily here than in the US), but from everything I've seen, it can be very hard to get any treatment until it gets that bad. May just be a bad sample set though.

Based on my experiences as an American living in Europe, the premise of this is entirely wrong. At least in some cases- I'm a freelancer without kids living in Germany. For someone who is employed, older, has kids, or lives in a different country, the calculation may be different. But overall, Europe isn't the healthcare utopia people make it out to be.

The cost of living in Europe is significantly lower than the US, not higher as the article suggests. Housing, food, everything. Overall I can live on much much less money than I did in the US. This may vary from city to city, but I think in many places in Europe this is true.

But health care is much more expensive in Europe. For me, part of this is due to being a freelancer- the public system is unaffordable for me because I would have to pay double, and pay double with my income calculated at a higher rate than I actually make. The private system is similarly expensive. It costs far more than health insurance in the US would for me. But in general, health insurance is not cheap.

Insurance also includes far less here than in the US. It doesn't include even basic preventative care when you are under a certain age. It also doesn't include stuff like birth control or STD tests. And even for things it covers, it's difficult to get any reimbursement at all from private health insurance. I've also found the medical system in Germany to be atrocious when you actually go to see a doctor. If you end up in the emergency room, you can get good care. But doctors seem to just wait until it gets that bad before doing much and often spout nearly-superstitious nonsense to justify not providing medical care. Maybe they just do this to me because I'm an immigrant though- possible Germans get better care.

As a result, I only have cheap, crappy insurance here. It's currently cheaper and more effective for me to have decent insurance in the US, and fly home whenever I need to go to the doctor. The US medical system under the ACA is amazing, better than nearly all Americans realize.