Kevin Gowen wrote:

> Michael Cash wrote:
> > If there is anything more bizarre and fucked up than the Sepponian
> > health insurance situation, I don't want to know about it. I
> > (re)injured a knee and my doctor recommended surgery. The hassle with
> > the insurance company to get it approved was unbelievable. I finally
> > got on the phone myself to a sweet young thang at the insurance
> > company and asked her what the deal was. Her words: "My supervisor,
> > Cricket, has to approve all surgeries".
> >
> > I gave up.
> >
> > My health care depended not on the judgment of a physician, but on
> > some inaccessible chick by the name of "Cricket".
>
> I think that Americans overuse health insurance to an alarming degree.
> Insurance of any kind is "oh shit" money.
> Oh shit! My house burned down! (here's your check)
> Oh shit! My car was crashed in a wreck! (here's your check)
> Oh shit! A crane fell on me and I need emergency care! (here's your check)
> Oh shit! I'm dead! (here's the check for the fam)
>
> This odd practice of using insurance to pay for the routine and expected
> expenses of maintaining one's health such as routine checkups, prescription
> medication, etc. is simply mind-boggling.Oh, and let's not forget the folks
> who think it is an employer's duty to provide heath insurance. I actually
> know a waiter in this town who thinks that his employer (a small restaurant
> in a strip mall) should be providing him health insurance.

Will you not look for such benefits in your employment package?

I know a woman (among many I've met) who *proudly* announced she had just quit
her job (and was "very happy"), and after hearing her dissatisfaction with her
old job, I suggested joining a well known temp agency to find the kind of work
she would like and have the kind of freedom from responsibility she explicitly
craved, she said that she *might* try it, AFTER collecting some unemployment.

This woman is apparently one of those many people, almost always women, I've
known who thinks they are entitled to receive hundreds of thousands, perhaps
even millions of yen, and enjoy a vacation of up to 330 days (perhaps even
traveling and shopping abroad), because they've paid a few hundred yen a month
in unemployment insurance, while other people even in a small place like
Fukuyama, like another woman I know, are only allowed to have ONE
discretionary holiday per year at Boon. This other woman was told this was the
first and last time she would be able to have such a day off.