Side Gigs/Work from home

[Corbic]

Originally Posted by mav1178

you should spend a few years not in the US/Europe and actually experience GOOD healthcare/health insurance.

Funny. I grew up in Europe, direct personal experience with Norwegian, Danish, British and Italian health care. My company is also an international powerhouse and I work daily with my teams in France, Czech Republics and England.

My wife is also European - as in born, raise and spent 27 years living there as with all her family.

Nothing like a 3 month waiting list for an MRI. She was shocked when we went to the doctor- she needed a CT scan and it wasn't "oh, lets schedule you". Nope, just roll you down the hall.

Close family friend in Norway died at 27 from a curable form of stomach cancer because she kept getting a run around with their system. Typically "Oh, you're just having leg cramps and weight loss because you are a marathon runner, drink more water." Hair falling out? Oh, have some vitamins. Finally her husband saved up to see a specialist in Germany - cash out of pocket - who was like "if you saw me a year ago we could have done something". She went back to Norway and they put her on their equivalent of Norwegian Hospice.

Had she been in America, she'd likely still have received a half-million in treatment despite the low probability of recovery - rather then just being triaged for lowest fucking cost vs. benefit care.

There is a reason wealthy Europeans don't use their Government "free" systems but pay out of pocket for procedures in Israel, Switzerland and the US.

Coworker went to Hong Kong for eye surgery because of the wait list. It was worth it to her to pay ~$7k to just get it fixed and not worry about further degradation to save a buck.

[/QUOTE]

Originally Posted by mav1178

As for higher education, I use the cost as a starting point. plenty of other education systems are just as bad K-12 but there is more of an emphasis on technical skill/engineering degrees at a substantially lower cost basis for undergraduate degrees.

but yes, you're correct and I'm wrong.

Education isn't just a cost. The entire system needs to be completely redone.

Example, in Norway, we didn't do sports, band, etc in school or for school. It was all detached clubs. There was a much larger emphasis on culture, geography and history. Shocking Meme- American's don't know Geography or who Peter the Great is - but we all know Babe Ruth and Rudy!

[mav1178]

Originally Posted by Corbic

Funny. I grew up in Europe, direct personal experience with Norwegian, Danish, British and Italian health care. My company is also an international powerhouse and I work daily with my teams in France, Czech Republics and England.

I specifically mentioned "NOT in the US/Europe" for a reason...

there are other countries not affiliated with the West that has great healthcare.

As for education it's not just a cost, but often times it ends up being the primary barrier to success in the US.

[Corbic]

Originally Posted by mav1178

I specifically mentioned "NOT in the US/Europe" for a reason...

there are other countries not affiliated with the West that has great healthcare.

As for education it's not just a cost, but often times it ends up being the primary barrier to success in the US.

Well please list all these countries.

Australia and Canada use the same European system.

This leaves us with the Middle East, India, Africa and South America - Nope.

Oh, ASIA!!

JAPANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!

China? I mean, I guess you can get Kidneys and Livers for STUPID cheap, right?!

[mav1178]

Originally Posted by Corbic

Well please list all these countries.

Australia and Canada use the same European system.

This leaves us with the Middle East, India, Africa and South America - Nope.

Oh, ASIA!!

JAPANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!

China? I mean, I guess you can get Kidneys and Livers for STUPID cheap, right?!

South Korea
Taiwan
Singapore

places that have great health care and low cost.

Taiwan especially, the out of pocket costs are cheap, even the cost of doing an MRI on your own is a miniscule percentage of your income versus in US/Europe.

[AKADriver]

Originally Posted by mav1178

South Korea
Taiwan
Singapore

places that have great health care and low cost.

Taiwan especially, the out of pocket costs are cheap, even the cost of doing an MRI on your own is a miniscule percentage of your income versus in US/Europe.

My FIL went back to Korea to get his lymphoma treated for that reason. The care was more 'bare bones' and assembly-line like by US standards but every bit as effective and far less expensive even having to pay more OOP because he hadn't paid into the system in decades. This kind of medicine in the US suffers from the same problems that Corbic sees in education - when costs are covered by expensive insurance policies, just like colleges are paid for by jumbo student loans, they're incentivized to make care more expensive and luxurious and push for more and more-expensive testing because this boosts profit, but it doesn't improve health!

Now, of course those places have other problems, back to the point of the thread there's no way in hell I'd want to work for a Korean company. But I could definitely see myself retiring there if I could subsist on my savings from working in the US and perhaps remote side work.

[mav1178]

Originally Posted by AKADriver

My FIL went back to Korea to get his lymphoma treated for that reason. The care was more 'bare bones' and assembly-line like by US standards but every bit as effective and far less expensive even having to pay more OOP because he hadn't paid into the system in decades. This kind of medicine in the US suffers from the same problems that Corbic sees in education - when costs are covered by expensive insurance policies, just like colleges are paid for by jumbo student loans, they're incentivized to make care more expensive and luxurious and push for more and more-expensive testing because this boosts profit, but it doesn't improve health!

Exactly this.

My issue is with how the system is structured cost-wise in the US. There is very little incentive to do things that go beyond your sources of funding... so if the state government tells you to teach a certain way, you teach that way or you lose money.

Same with medical, the hospitals keep saying "oh this is how our pricing is built into our system"... so why is it so stupid?

Even car parts is almost in the same realm. The concept of a 30-50% markup from cost was actually something that Japanese companies did when they first entered the US market 20+ years ago, believe it or not. Like if you are a Greddy WD, your cost is somewhere around 35-40% off MSRP and a regular dealer buying from a middle man pays 25% or so off MSRP.

Japan domestic dealers doesn't have this type of markup, at least not on that scale... they value direct dealers more, so there is no incentive to lower the price artificially (from MSRP) to sell more volume.