rothaine
When I needed a new washer, I did a lot of research and strongly considered Speed Queen. But then I read they enshittified in 2018
Didn't Asus start enshittifying recently? Thought I saw some chatter about that on here 😢
Did they actually go to space? I haven't watched a Fast and Furious since, like, 5
I called the insurance company about the bullshit "out of network ambulance" and they said they would "negotiate on our behalf", apparently. In the end we paid about $2200 for the ambulance if I remember right.
Everything else we paid sticker price. Fortunately I had some money in an HSA from a previous job so that helped.
(For people reading this who live in more civilized countries: an HSA is a special type of account where you can put money and not pay taxes on it, with the caveat that it can only be used for health expenses. It's similar to the much more common FSA, but with an FSA the account balance is reset to zero at the end of the year (not sure if the money goes to the government or the brokerage or what). This has led to a new absurd "FSA store" industry, where places sell only FSA-eligible items at a very high markup, with the idea being come December you'd rather buy their overpriced shit than just lose all the money outright. An HSA does not suffer from this nonsense (you keep the money indefinitely, because it's your money), but it seems like it's becoming more rare for an HSA to be offered on employer plans.)
I have (what I believe) is considered "very good" insurance. I pay $100 a month for premiums.
When my child was born, there were some complications and we needed to move to another hospital for emergency surgery.
The birth: ~$2500 deductible/copay/whatever you want to call it. I think this is all I would've had to pay if there weren't more complications.
Surgery and aftercare for baby: ~$5600
Care for momma: ~$2000
But here's a crazy twist. When moving hospitals, we rode in an ambulance. But this was an "out of network ambulance". What the hell is even that? Under what circumstances do you have a say in which ambulance you ride?
Out of network ambulance ride: $4500
Basically it's all just bullshit.
The insurance companies having more say than doctors about what procedures you can and can't get is peak insanity, and yet here we are.
Yeah the pledge is definitely weird.
Eh I don't buy that, at least not as the primary goal. It's more a side effect of the structure and resources of a class. When the classrooms were built to support 18 students per class, and the teacher's union contract says they'll have a max of 25 students per class, but in actuality they have 31 students per class, kids sharing desks and bumping elbows, yeah we kinda need all 31 of those kids to sit down and buckle up, or no one at all is going to get any learning done.
Is it the ideal learning environment for every student? Nope. Is it the ideal learning environment for any student? Probably not. But unless we're willing to invest more in education, it's what we're working with.
I think they want kids to pay attention in class
Huh. That is way cooler
Because they already raised hundreds of millions from investors