AFF's Doublethink

Bob — April 21, 2009 at 4:56 pm

You really deserve to have your head severed off, you insufferable pile of crap. Please do earth a favor and commit suicide.

Sonny Bunch — April 21, 2009 at 5:40 pm

Yikes. Didn’t realize that the prophet Muhammed was an asthmatic.

luther blissett — April 21, 2009 at 6:38 pm

When you’re diagnosed with cancer and hit your insurance ceiling, let us know which hospital is simultaneously treating and bankrupting you, and we’ll see if we can summon up more sympathy at your bedside.

b.g. — April 21, 2009 at 7:29 pm

That law student is pulling himself up by his bootstraps. You know, like you wingnuts are always exhorting people to do? But I guess since he has health problems, that’s his tough luck. Typical selfish wingnut attitude.

jojo — April 21, 2009 at 9:40 pm

You really are a miserable tool, you vile ugly troll.

jojo — April 21, 2009 at 9:40 pm

yes, i meant sonny

Sonny Bunch — April 21, 2009 at 11:09 pm

Luther: If I knew I had cancer, decided to opt out of insurance while I had cancer in favor of going to a graduate school that I couldn’t afford to pay for, and then complained about it afterward, you might have a point.

b.g.: I’m all in favor of people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps. But he’s not doing that. You know what people who pull themselves up don’t do? Steal. Steal from hard-working, self-sufficient people. You know what our law student is doing? Stealing. Nobody has to go to law school to provide for themselves. Indeed: our prospective student didn’t have to go to law school! He had a perfectly good paying job as a paralegal.

jojo: Glad you clarified that.

uniondad — April 21, 2009 at 11:19 pm

Bob, can you sever someone’s head on???? You imbecilic pile of impetuosity.

uniondad — April 21, 2009 at 11:23 pm

Double for you JoJo!

Dan — April 22, 2009 at 8:34 am

So, you’re saying because someone makes a foolish financial decision, they should die of asthma related suffacation?

That’s a great idea!

MS — April 22, 2009 at 10:26 am

Wow, this certainly makes the case for universal health care.

Anyone who has ever been a freelancer, or self-employed (or a graduate student most places) will tell you that the single scariest aspect of it is WHAT HAPPENS IF I GET SICK? Or worse, WHAT HAPPENS IF MY CHILD GETS SICK?

The simple fact is that decent health insurance is essentially out of reach for most people in those situations. Insurance companies charge outrageous amounts and cherrypick only the individuals least likely to actually need any care. Then, they drop you if you do have a major claim.

I would almost certainly be unable to get health insurance as an individual, through no fault of my own, due to some congenital problems. With regular care, certain meds, and some attention on my part to diet and exercise, there’s no reason I can’t live out a standard lifespan, or even to a ripe old age, but I couldn’t do it without my health insurance. Without it, I would almost certainly die much younger than need be.

I have insurance only because my employer, one of my state’s two flagship universities, has several thousand employees it provides insurance for, and thus has enough clout to require its insurance company to cover everybody.

Should only the independently wealthy (or those whose spouses have good employer-provided health insurance) be able to be writers, artists, entrepreneurs, small business owners, independent contractors, or go to law school? That seems to be what you’re saying.

Health care is like fire or police protection, roads, parks, libraries, public schools, or any number of other things we pool our resources for for the common good. So far I’ew never needed the fire department, but I don’t mind my share of the taxes that pay for it, because I might someday. I don’t have kids, either, but I don’t begrudge school taxes.

In the long run, a single-payer system would almost certainly cost less than the hideously inefficient system we have now, which is way more about making a handful of people at the top very, very rich, than it is about actually providing health care for people.

uniondad — April 22, 2009 at 4:06 pm

MS,
In a perfect world you would be correct. However, having experienced universal health care/single-payer systems in several countries in Europe and Canada they do not work as well as our, in your opinion, flawed or “hideously inefficient” health care system. Overcrowded emergency rooms, delayed surgeries and other treatments, denial of lifesaving treatments, etc. etc. are much more the benchmark in single-payer systems than the exception.
Where do you end this “entitlement” mentality and argument? With our overly litigious society, insurance is essentially an even bigger liability for the average person. Should we “pool” our money to provide insurance for everybody that choses to not purchase it? If someone owns a safer/nicer/bigger automobile than you should we pool our resources to provide you with one just as big/nice/safe? Same goes for homes and many other items we purchase with the fruits of our labors. I too would have loved to been a permanent graduate student, starving artist or writer, law school student, or surfing instructor with no responsibilities since everybody else had to pool their hard earned dollars to pay for my lack of responsibility.
Of course you could always renounce you US citizenship and as an illegal alien have access to the best medical system in the world, at no cost. Just a thought

MS — April 22, 2009 at 8:26 pm

uniondad:

Well, I guess you’re right. Now that I know that all those countries with “socialist” medicine have shorter life spans and higher infant mortality rates…oh, wait a minute.

Well, certainly they spend more per capita on health care than we do while covering fewer people…oops.

But what about all those mass movements in all those countries to get rid of their health care systems and change over to our way of…hmmm.

OK, where do you draw the line? If your house is burning down and you can’t afford whatever it costs to have them come put it out, are you just out of luck? Shall we institute a per use fee for city parks?

And do you really think that emergency rooms in this country are never overcrowded, necessary surgeries are never postponed or denied, or that lifesaving treatments are never withheld in this country? Really? REALLY?

I’ve actually been pretty lucky so far, but an acquaintance of mine came down with a rare, life-threatening and highly contagious illness a few years ago. Stupidly, he did so while “out of area.” He happened to be in a small town, where the local hospital simply wasn’t equipped to handle the situation, so he had to be evacuated by helicopter to a larger city, then held in intensive care/isolation for quite a while, then in a regular unit before he could finally go home. Afterwards, he spent an hour or two a day, FOR AN ENTIRE YEAR, doing paperwork. He would get a bill for tens of thousands of dollars, arrange for his insurance to cover (or so he thought) and then months later get the same bill over again. The company tried to deny payment for tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars worth of treatment that they legally owed.

And he was lucky: he at least had an insurance plan (not to mention that he’s white and a professional), so the hospital didn’t just do the bare minimum and kick him out, like they would have done with, say, a homeless black guy.

uniondad — April 22, 2009 at 11:34 pm

MS,
In response to your first three points: Regardless of what the statistics seem to state, I have seen a friend sit in an emergency room in Canada with a broken ankle for seven hours and finally have his friends take them away put him on an airline flight and fly back to the US for treatment. ERs in the UK that allow people to sit in their holding area with active bleeding head wounds for hours until the wound clotted over and the patient gave up and left, skull fracture and all???? And what Socialist country has ever voted to do away with the DOLE? None that I am aware of. Again the sense of entitlement, once established, will never be voted away by those that do not want to work and only want life provided to them free of charge. See England, the once upon a time Empire the Sun never set on, now a welfare state that barely survives.

Many county and state parks already charge fees to enjoy them. And many rural counties charge a fee for fire and rescue service. Welcome to the real world.

I never stated that our ERs are never overcrowded, just that having experienced ones overseas and in Canada ours are better staffed, run, and experienced. If we had laws similar to many of those countries our ERs would run even better because illegal aliens would not be able to use the ER for their routine medical care which would get rid of 60-75% of the patients in the average ER and save our hospitals and taxpayers untold millions. Especially in the border states.

Even though you malign our medical system your acquaintance is alive and well. Even though he was “out of area”, had to be aerovaced to a better hospital, spent unknown days/weeks in intensive care, AND SURVIVED. And you use that as a negative example???? AT LEAST YOUR ACQUAINTANCE IS STILL ALIVE!! Very possibly that might not be the case in the “wonderlands of socialism” you want our medical system to mirror. We all battle with insurance companies, billing agencies, our bosses, grocery baggers, toll booth operators, family members, neighgors, etc ad nauseum. SO WHAT. Your buddy is alive and fighting.

Nice strawman argument: “not to mention that he’s white and a professional” A sad attempt to deflect the discussion into race baiting. Many a white homeless guy or gal has gotten the same level of treatment as the black homeless individual. Poor white folks struggle just a mightily against the insurance monster as do blacks. Bean counters don’t care about color just coverage.

The bottom line: Not very many US citizens immigrating to the socialist utopian countries you mention. But a lot of their citizens are clamoring to enter the US. Checkmate

Ms. Kate NZ — April 23, 2009 at 2:03 am

Actually, uniondad, I personally am a US citizen who emigrated to the socialist utopian country of New Zealand last August. My husband and I were professionals with good insurance. New Zealand doesn’t have a fully single payer system except for medical emergencies.

BUT the system in place is subsidized. We pay less in the walk-in minor emergency clinic here (with no insurance coverage) than we paid in co-pays in the US. Our payments for doctor’s visits at our regular GP clinic, with no government subsidy whatsoever, are half what we paid in co-pays in the US.

And all that without the $600 and change we were paying PER MONTH for insurance coverage for our family of four.

Oh, and labwork is practically free.

And don’t get me started on how joyous it is to live in a society where people don’t have that nagging fear of disaster. If you’re unemployed, there’s a benefit. When I first heard of it, I thought it was like the horrid system in the US where it’s manipulated so that you jump through ridiculous hoops to get as little as possible.

Ah, no. “The Benefit” or “WINZ,” as they say in Kiwiland, is for everyone who needs an income supplement. Everyone is taken care of in some way, however small, if they need it. Even recent migrants like us with only 3-year permits are eligible for something. We have not yet investigated it much but are considering a Working With Families benefit as my husband has had difficulty finding employment in this recession.

As for our current family income, I gross 43,000 per year in my very middle class job. I pay about 33% in income taxes. In the US I paid 25%.

The difference is , the amount I paid to insurance companies every month alone made any tax rate gains or losses or whatever a ridiculous joke.

That is why, for the first time, we can live on one middle class income quite comfortably. We have a little flat instead of the big house we had in Texas. We went from two cars to two bus passes. My husband has had difficulty getting a job and it has not impacted us in the least except for his personal frustration.

It’s that kind of freedom from fear, fear of job loss, of a medical crisis, or some other form of ruin that makes a society or culture as a whole so much happier and stress free.

Ms. Kate NZ — April 23, 2009 at 2:51 am

Oh, and ANOTHER thing. My job in the US was medical social work. And unlike you, apparently, I saw plenty of people going without medical care because they couldn’t afford it and no insurance company would touch them for preexisting. Their choice was the emergency room or the free clinics. And they had to have an income check for those. So, well, sometimes not the free clinics.

These people, most with chronic conditions (I worked with neurology patients, HIV/AIDS, and the elderly), had to hope and pray that there was a programme somewhere with a grant that might, might, cover some of their healthcare. But often the programmes’ grants would cover ONLY a particular type of disorder. For instance, I had an HIV+ young man who got an tonsillitis. His only doctor was his HIV doctor through our programme. He worked for a company that offered health insurance, but, you know. Not for him. We stretched the diagnosis to the breaking point to try to find some connection to his HIV diagnosis so our programme could cover the cost. Couldn’t be done; wasn’t approved.

He didn’t have a “long wait for treatment” because there was no treatment. He couldn’t afford it. But, hey, uniondad and Sonny Bunch, at least he didn’t have to WAIT, huh?

And when dumbasses glorify the state of health care in the US because you spend oh so much money and have oh so many gadgets and your insurance companies show so much profit (scratch that one, it’s not money actually paid for health CARE, is it?), they don’t know that a lot of that money goes to private programme A and county programme B and state programme C and state programme D, all with their attendant paperwork and coverage rules and crap that takes whole offices of people to figure out, just to keep together the bodies and souls of the uninsured chronically ill for a few more years.

These programmes, which have to be coordinated for each patient according to income and circumstances (that’s where I came in), are the only thing keeping the American streets from being littered with the kind of body count that would be the result of “market driven health care.”

Poor people with tough but treatable health conditions have a far worse quality of life and die sooner. Full stop. Because we (wait, YOU) have this ridiculous, illogical, fuck the poor culture in the US. Trust me, what you sneeringly call “socialist utopian countries” have been shaking their heads at the capitalist dystopian countries like those in South America and South Africa and South Canada…whoops, I mean the US.

MS — April 23, 2009 at 10:07 am

uniondad: You really didn’t respond to my first three points. While I agree that health care in the US can be spectacularly good, if you’re rich and/or have great insurance, we rank 43rd (after Cuba, among other nations) in infant mortality and 47th in life expectancy. We spend twice as much per capita on health care as any other nation, and still have millions of people with little or no access to regular, non-emergency room care. Other stats are similarly grim: http://www.healthpaconline.net/health-care-statistics-in-the-united-states.htm

We could be doing a lot better, especially for the money we spend.

And actually, there are very few immigrants from “socialist” nations like Denmark or Sweden, but lots from capitalist paradises like El Salvador and Guatemala. I’ve spent a fair amount of time in England, and while it has its problems, none of my English acquaintances has the slightest desire to live here. Visit, yes. Live, no. And while they gripe about the national health service, they also unanimously agree that it worked just fine until Thatcher tried to destroy it by underfunding it.

And yes, state and national parks charge fees (although they would have to charge more without tax revenues). I’m fine with that, but the park down the block? The public library? Cops? And I’m unaware of rural counties charging a per-use fee for firefighting, but let’s assume they do. Do they charge up front and let your house burn down if you can’t pay? And do they try to bankrupt you afterwards if you still can’t pay?

And yes, I consider my acquaintance’s experience a failure, on balance, on the part of the health care system. While it’s true that if he lived in, say, Somalia, he doubtless would have died. To that extent his experience was a success, I’ll grant you. But if he lived in, say, France, he would have gotten the same treatment but not had to spend several hundred hours doing the same paperwork over and over again, or fighting to get his insurance carrier to pay perfectly legit claims. This is time he could have devoted to his job, his creative work, his family, even his hobbies. Doing a certain amount of paperwork is not intrinsically evil, but the equivalent of 8-10 weeks of a full-time job for one incident, however serious? Not reasonable, and not a valid comparison with the examples you cite.

A couple of years ago I had to go to the emergency room. I ended up staying overnight in the hospital and getting a bunch of tests. All the work was done under the same roof in the span of less than 24 hours, but the bills trickled in for months afterward from:

the hospital itself
the hospital pharmacy
the company that actually ran the emergency room and provided personnel for same
the company that did the tests
the company that provided the doctor who interpreted the tests
the company that provided the doctor who interpreted the interpretation of the tests and eventually discharged me

Why couldn’t this have come in one bill within a week or two of the incident? How much of the cost of the stay was in redundant accounting?

And while the insurance company didn’t, in this case, give me any hassle, it was still a lot of time on my part spent on paperwork. And just when I thought I had it all done, something else would come in.

I ended up paying about $500 out of pocket after insurance. I can deal with that, but without insurance it would have been a catastrophe, and would be for most people. The fear of such keeps a lot of smart, creative people from starting their own business, setting up as freelancer, going back to grad or professional school, etc. Apparently you DO think only rich people should get to do that. And nice dismissal of such people as “surfing instructors.” Actually, come to think of it, what’s wrong with being a surfing instructor if people are willing to pay for said instruction?

And if you think skin color doesn’t affect the health care you get, you’re dreaming. Maybe not as much as it used to, and maybe not as much as economic status, but yeah, it does.

dilla — April 23, 2009 at 5:57 pm

Sonny, I do hope someday you get the golden opportunity to experience for yourself the same level of compassion, sympathy, and mercy that you mete out to others.

uniondad — April 23, 2009 at 11:45 pm

Ms Kate NZ,
Sorry can’t opine on NZ’s health care, welfare system, or Utopian tendencies as I have only visited there for short periods of time. I remember great beer, friendly people and an awesome rugby team.
Based on your description it seems very similar to England’s system of the DOLE, but I could be wrong. Therefore, I freely accept your description of your current situation. I did notice a few facts in your first posting that seem pertinent to your opinion.
You stated:
“That is why, for the first time, we can live on one middle class income quite comfortably. We have a little flat instead of the big house we had in Texas. We went from two cars to two bus passes.”
I would have to ask, why move to NZ to downsize? Did you try a smaller house in Texas? Dropping the two Lexus sedans or Chevy 4×4 trucks for the two bus passes? It would seem with those cutbacks you would have had a much easier time making those insurance payments, and as you state: “freedom from fear, fear of job loss, of a medical crisis, or some other form of ruin that makes a society or culture as a whole so much happier and stress free.
My family already does this by not living beyond our means. No huge credit card bills. One middle class income. Older model cars instead of two new ones in the driveway. And no handouts of any sort from anywhere. Do we worry about tragedy or crisis? Of course, not just for our family but for our brothers, sisters, parents, and extended family. We save and plan and react to whatever situation presents itself, as a family. We take care of our own as best we can.
I certainly have no concept of your family’s situation or motivations to move to a foreign country and expect them to support you. It seems you have chosen the same path that many immigrants, legal and other, that come to the United States and expect the taxpayer to “supplement” their life style. For me personnally, I would NEVER put myself and my family in that situation. I pay my way even if it means haveing to work two jobs and/or manual labor for minimum wages.
But enough of this. I have to get to sleep so I can get to work in the morning and pay “all” my bills, without handouts or “supplements” of any sort. Sure would be nice to have somebody cover my responsibilities, even for just a little while.
Sarcasim intended!

uniondad — April 24, 2009 at 12:41 am

MS,
Surfing instructor was one of my dreams as a young man, until that damn reality reared it’s ugly head.
Do you really believe Cuba correctly reports any of it’s data to the internationl community? If you do my high school spanish instructor whose family fled Castro’s communist takeover will be happy to slap your face while correcting your inimical view of Castro’s interpretation of Utopia. You strategically left out Nicaragua and Venezuela when you wrote of Central America. Do you have the standard liberal blinders when it comes to dictators and thugs like Chavez and Ortega? Those socialist utopias are Hell. I’ve been to both, have you? You want to speak of income distribution inequities? Look at those two countries. Free press, doesn’t exist in either. Health care for the masses, doesn’t exist PERIOD.
I 100% agree we could do better with the money we spend on health care. If We, as American citizens, didn’t have to cover the ER costs for the millions of illegal immigrants our health care costs would be DRAMATICALLY lower. And our premiums would be as well. The Mexican Government provides comic book style information booklets for illegal immigrants on how to use OUR emergeny rooms for their routine medical care. This is a major reason your visit cost so much.
And I repeat myself from an earlier post. YOU ARE ALIVE AND KICKING AND IT ONLY COST YOU $500. Now I don’t know how much money you make in a year, but even on welfare $500 isn’t a very large percentage of your yearly income. ESPECIALLY SINCE YOU ARE ALIVE AND WELL. ALIVE AND WELL AND FOR ONLY $500!!!!! I cannot emphasize this enough. You even state: And while the insurance company didn’t, in this case, give me any hassle, it was still a lot of time on my part spent on paperwork. And just when I thought I had it all done, something else would come in. What the hell else do you want??? You are alive and the insurance company didn’t even argure about the cost of saving you life. I am confused beyond belief. So you had to spend a little of your time filling out forms and answering questions in exchange FOR YOUR LIFE! What a bleeding heart liberal victim.
In Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela you most likely would be DEAD. Not with us any more, worm food, etc. Unless you have lived in France you don’t know your friend wouldn’t have had to spend as much or more time fighting the insurance or state for his medical care. Kneejerk supposition that France is better than America, doubtfull at best.
And last but not certainly not least. I don’t view people based upon their skin color, but liberals surely do. Thank God the manjority of Americans treat people as people. Liberals have to catoragize people as victims and only interact with them as such! Move beyond the 50’s and 60’s, everybody but liberals and race baiters already have!!!! We have a multi race man as president of the United States for goodness sake, what more do you need to prove my point?

Ms. Kate NZ — April 24, 2009 at 1:39 am

uniondad, you didn’t read my admittedly long-winded posts carefully. And you made some pretty careless assumptions about my former lifestyle.

I don’t have any particular supplements here in NZ. Like none, even ones I’m apparently entitled to. My post stated that I pay a far higher percentage of my paycheck in taxes here than in Texas, USA, and that what I get in return in this country is incredibly worth it. The healthcare alone, even without state benefits or insurance, for example. Add in more stable and safe citizens and it’s what I call crazygood!

As for your assumptions, I drove a $4000 station wagon that we paid cash for at the used car lot and my husband drove an old Mazda truck that he inherited when his father passed away. No Lexi in our driveway.

In Texas where I lived it was pretty much impossible to live without a car as there was no public transport to think of. Buses and trains are not a high priority for rednecks.

MS — April 25, 2009 at 1:31 am

Uniondad: could you possibly have misunderstood my point about my emergency room visit any more thoroughly? I came out fine, $500 wasn’t an excessive percentage of my income, and I’m very happy, overall. I never said nor implied otherwise. My points were: 1) that the paperwork required was excessive, repetitive, redundant and almost certainly added a great deal to the cost, and 2) without employer-provided insurance I would have been screwed for years, quite possibly for the rest of my life. And I couldn’t have bought health insurance on my own.

What I want is simply one bill, itemizing all the charges, within a reasonable time frame, not a dozen or more bills, trickling in over the course of a year or longer. Why is that so unreasonable a desire?

What I also want is for any US citizen (or legal, tax-paying resident) not to be financially ruined by a medical emergency. And I am willing to pay my fair share of the tax cost to make that possible.

And for God’s sake, look at the stats: the US is simply way behind almost all of the other prosperous countries in many standard measures of health, and even behind some third-world countries like Cuba in certain measures, like infant mortality. If you dispute the generally accepted stats, you really need to give some viable reason for doing so. It’s not enough just to accuse Cuba of misreporting because you don’t like Cuba. You have to back up said accusation.

I haven’t actually been in Sweden or Denmark, but I have been in the free enterprise paradises of Guatemala and El Salvador, and unless everything I’ve ever read about Sweden and Denmark is a lie, I’ll take them over Central America any day. Recent widely-publicized studies have said that the happiest people on the planet, overall, are the Danes. Here’s just one reference: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/02/14/60minutes/main3833797.shtml . There are literally hundreds more. I suppose it’s possible that the authors of the studies were just lying, but until I see some actual evidence to that effect, I will work on the assumption that it’s true. A big factor in the Danes’ contentment is universal health care (also a secure universal retirement plan, so that people who worked hard all their adult lives aren’t reduced to living on the streets and eating cat food in their old age).

Anecdotal, and not offered for more than that: I speak fluent Spanish and once in a while I go to a public library-sponsored evening where gringoes like me go to practice their Spanish and recent immigrants some to practice their English. A while back I was in a conversation with a guy from Cuba. He couldn’t find enough bad things to say about the Castro regime (and believe me, Cuban Spanish is VERY rich in invective and obscenities). But even he admitted that 1) he had gotten a superb education, from kindergarten through professional school (he was an engineer), all for free; and 2) he had always gotten excellent medical care, also free, in Cuba. He said that he worried a lot about what would happen if he got sick before he could land a job that provided medical insurance, something he had never worried about in Cuba.

uniondad — April 26, 2009 at 1:16 am

MS,

I’ve lost my last two answers to your post so here goes the quick and dirty.

On rereading your first post about your ER visit you never mentioned “being very happy overall” The tone of the post was very negative and that was what I was responding to so I don’t believe I “missunderstood your point..more thoroughly”

I would agree that one office one bill would be outstanding. However, no one office or ER, with the exception of some Trauma centers, can afford all the machines, technicians, and xxxologists to perform all possible tests and procedures 24/365. Economy of scale is the only way to keep the system even remotely affordable. And no government program has ever cut costs or provided a service at a lesser price than the private sector. I for one don’t want a government bureaucrat involved in my doctor’s and my decisions. Not with the force of law behind them. At least with an HMO one can force them to provide services when they are wrong.

Accuse Cuba of misreporting, you bet. Communist countries lie about everything, they have to so as to hide the true living conditions of their people. In support of this accusation: Cuba reported that Fidel Castro was reelected with 100% of the vote in his last election. Belive that one?

Your acquaintance has a much different opinion of the way Cuba doles out higher education benefits than the numerous Cuban escapees I have spoken with. They believe that the political connections the family has drives all standards of living. And if your belief is that universal health care is the main reason the Dane’s are the happiest people in the world and Cuba offers this benefit as well then WHY DID YOUR ACQUAINTANCE LEAVE CUBA FOR THE HORRIBLE UNITED STATES?? Where you imply he will grow old in the street while eating cat food.

I agree 100 percent that living in a non third world country is much much more desireable. El Salvador and Guatemala are no better or worse than Nicaragua, who promises national health care and doesn’t begin to deliver.

I guess we will have to disagree. You seem to think the US is much worse than any number of countries. I have traveled to and worked/lived in many countries and find that even though they all have wonderful aspects, in totality the United States beats them all. Any citizen can aspire to any goal, everybody has access to what they need although not necessarily what they want, our definition of poor is upper upper middle class in any number of countries around the world. Trust me, we’ve got the best of it by far.