this post was submitted on 17 Oct 2024
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Asklemmy

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[–] POTOOOOOOOO@reddthat.com 89 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Health Insurance that covers next to nothing but costs a fortune anyway.

[–] Vanth@reddthat.com 42 points 2 weeks ago (9 children)

☝️ recently got a covid test that based on all my research beforehand, it should have been covered except for $10 I would pay.

Jokes on me, it actually cost me $200 they charged to my credit card two weeks later. I didn't even get to know the price at the time I needed medical care.

Sometimes other countries make fun of America for things they don't understand. Not on this one, America deserves every bit of mocking it gets for it's medical coverage atrocity.

[–] disguy_ovahea@lemmy.world 15 points 2 weeks ago

You can get free rapid covid test kits from the US government with a valid mailing address.

https://special.usps.com/testkits

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[–] Achyu@lemmy.sdf.org 85 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

Recently?

How a lawyer in America got jailed for legally fighting against(and defeating) an American multi-national oil company that polluted the Amazon and more importantly harmed the lives and health of the locals with the pollution.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OtIAZMqrZE
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Donziger

[–] BertramDitore@lemm.ee 31 points 2 weeks ago

Donziger’s story is heartbreaking and infuriating, and I’m continually disappointed that so few people are familiar with his story and what the courts did to him. It’s one of the clearest examples of judicial corruption and the power and benefits that are afforded to corporations and almost never extended to the people fighting for what’s right and just.

[–] sigmaklimgrindset@sopuli.xyz 14 points 2 weeks ago

In June 2022, a federal appeals court affirmed Donziger's criminal contempt conviction. In March 2023, the Supreme Court declined to hear further appeals.

I'm shocked.

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[–] whaleross@lemmy.world 67 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Here in Sweden we currently have the problem that hospitals are understaffed and keeping wages of nurses so low that a lot of nurses quit and leave the others with an even crazier workload so the hospitals buy nurses semi permanently from temp agencies that cost multiple times more and the rental nurses have better pay and agreements of overtime and such. We had a well functioning health care but then the privatisation of everything and selling out communally owned services to private profit making schemes since the 90s. Because our government has been dominated by right wing market liberals and "sossehöger" - social democrats that jump on right wing populism to stay in power when they can rather than being consistent in left wing ideals.

Fucking end the market liberal experiment already. "The market solves all problems" - yeah, of it's own interest which is how to squeeze out more profits regardless the how and how low it stoops.

[–] Postmortal_Pop@lemmy.world 25 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Damn, I didn't know America was contagious...

[–] whaleross@lemmy.world 30 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (2 children)

It's been the strategy of the right wing here since forever - get in power sell out as much they can (and for some unfathomable reason for discount prices), fuck things up in general, leave it to a left wing government to salvage what can be saved while blaming them for public service being garbage so they can motivate selling out more when they have power again. It's a mix of blind idealists and profiteering scum that are in liaison with the right wing nationalist party with former nazi connections and obviously the Christian democrat leader that models the party according to the republicans is the most buddy-buddy with the fringe right.

And the populist right wing of course romanticises about the good days when everyone had housing and was safe and provided and so on - that was built solely by the left and the right wing fought them every step of the way and that they have since then torn down. Blatant lies and disinformation all the way.

But it is what people vote for. We get the societal break down we deserve.

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[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 9 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

EVERY instance of 'public-private' healthcare goes that route, touted as the wave of the future and a seamless melding of public interest and delicious capitalist pork, and then every single one of them gets drunk on the cash and goes toxic like this.

It's happening to Canada too. And France. And London.

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[–] fart_pickle@lemmy.world 35 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I cannot find the exact quote but it was something like "If you don't grow, you're dying". This is the source of all enshittification. Companies are being forced by VCs to increase revenue every year to meet unreasonable revenue goals just to satisfy a handful of investors.

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[–] piyuv@lemmy.world 32 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

“Vote with your wallet” means more money gets you more votes.

Some users leaving Reddit/instagram/twitter is not a problem, especially considering network effects, but some advertisers leaving is a crisis.

[–] fart_pickle@lemmy.world 16 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I think you misinterpreted the phrase. "Vote with your wallet" means that if you're unhappy with a product/service, you stop using/paying for it.

[–] piyuv@lemmy.world 9 points 2 weeks ago (7 children)

So long as the capital markets were willing to continue funding loss-making future monopolists, your neighbors were going to make the choice to shop "the wrong way." As small, local businesses lost those customers, the costs they had to charge to make up the difference would go up, making it harder and harder for you to afford to shop "the right way."

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/12/give-me-convenience/

Food for your thought.

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[–] xnx@slrpnk.net 30 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (5 children)
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[–] kibiz0r@midwest.social 29 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

A more recent example comes from the med-tech giant Abbott Labs, which used DMCA 1201 to suppress a tool that allowed people with diabetes to link their glucose monitors to their insulin pumps, in order to automatically calculate and administer doses of insulin in an "artificial pancreas." -eff.org

We joke about someday having to jailbreak our own organs, but we're basically already there.

An exoskeleton let a paralyzed man walk. Then its maker refused repairs.

Doctors Remove Woman’s Brain Implant Against Her Will

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[–] superkret@feddit.org 28 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Today I heard Meta has laid off workers because they brought their own food for lunch instead of buying it from the company cafeteria.

[–] beliquititious@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Well yes, but also no. Meta fired those folks because they were using their lunch stipend provided by meta for things other than lunch. Petty, given how much they were paying the employees, but almost certainly a breach of contract on the employee's part.

Meta is probably trying to do layoffs without paying layoff costs or taking the stock hit layoffs can cause. Which is still capitalist AF by any measure, lol. For fans of watching what kind of shit the oligarchy is trying now, Meta is definitely one to keep an eye on. Mark Zuckerberg has been moving very conservative very quickly lately.

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[–] fckreddit@lemmy.ml 28 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

My boss once said to a group of new joinees including me," Eventually you will be able to afford subscription to all the streaming services."

[–] roux@hexbear.net 10 points 2 weeks ago

Well, that was a lie.

[–] Kwakigra@beehaw.org 28 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Capitalists will say that it's fine for an economy to have a few capitalists own all capital and all physical and intellectual property while common people are only allowed to rent it from the capitalists at whatever rate the capitalist pleases. However, capitalists will also say that the evil of socialism is that you won't be allowed to own property. That's the most capitalist thing I'm aware of.

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[–] PumpkinDrama@reddthat.com 27 points 2 weeks ago (5 children)

I once read that there are some states in the U.S. where firefighters don't put out fires in houses that don't pay a monthly subscription.

[–] LrdThndr@lemmy.world 35 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

I live in an area with a subscription fire service.

It’s not expensive - around $200/year. And if you don’t have a subscription they still come and put out your fire or cut you out of the car or whatever needs to be done. You just get a bill for $3000/hr/apparatus that responds.

But I still find it abhorrent. Just put it in my fucking taxes and be done with it. Jesus.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 18 points 2 weeks ago

I live in an area with a subscription fire service.

I thought the earlier guy was doing a joke. I knew that those were a thing in the 1800's or something, but even today?

You just get a bill for $3000/hr/apparatus that responds.

That's pretty insane. So basically the firemen and ambulances are too expensive for the average citizen to use, and if you happen to be black, you probably don't want to call the cops either.

Great services.

Ameeerica, fuck yeah!

[–] Collatz_problem@hexbear.net 16 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)
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[–] slazer2au@lemmy.world 10 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Private fire fighters have been a thing since at least the 1600s.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 13 points 2 weeks ago

No no. Not "since", but "in".

It genuinely shocked me those still exist in the states. That's fucking insane.

We have a somewhat different mentality about public safety here in Finland.

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[–] Crozekiel@lemmy.zip 26 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Motorcycle airbag vests that will not work if you aren't up-to-date on the subscription payments when you have a crash...

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[–] Meron35@lemmy.world 23 points 2 weeks ago

Hong Kong's subway system offers fare discounts if you use the entrances/exits that require you to walk through a mall, as part of their monetisation of spaces required to access public services

[–] Evilsandwichman@hexbear.net 21 points 2 weeks ago

Some random company that sells fruits overthrowing another country's government; it's so ludicrous I'd say it's too silly to be the plot of a serious movie and like no no, actually this ludicrous story is actually real.

[–] emerald@lemmy.blahaj.zone 21 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

I see a private ambulance service driving around my town occasionally and it always makes my skin crawl

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[–] TheOSINTguy@sh.itjust.works 21 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Charging money for supplies after people had there whole lives uprooted by a natural disaster. Cough cough hurricane helene

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[–] DampSquid@feddit.uk 21 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)
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[–] RadDevon@lemmy.zip 18 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

My brother used to work for an SEO company. They charged clients to have their web sites on directories which would improve their Google pagerank… until Google updated the algorithm to penalize sites listed in these directories. The company quickly pivoted to charging the same clients to have them removed from the directories they had just charged them to be listed in.

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[–] hyacin@lemmy.ml 17 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

A peanut with a top hat and a monocle selling you other peanuts, to eat.

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[–] InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world 17 points 2 weeks ago

The purposeful degradation of repair.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 16 points 2 weeks ago

The US Empire.

[–] jerkface@lemmy.ca 16 points 2 weeks ago

suppressing wages and social housing so that starvation and homelessness make labour cheaper

[–] aramis87@fedia.io 15 points 2 weeks ago

That person who was in a car that ended up crossing three lanes, hitting a pole and then hitting a tree. They declined an ambulance because they were scared of the ambulance bill - then got a bill for $150 for refusing the ambulance. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[–] Etterra@lemmy.world 14 points 2 weeks ago

That you can lease prison labor.

[–] ShimmeringKoi@hexbear.net 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)
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[–] Phineaz@feddit.org 9 points 2 weeks ago

Projecting ads onto the tunnel walls off of a moving subway. Seen in mainland ~~Taiwan~~ China.

[–] zante@lemmy.wtf 8 points 2 weeks ago

You can’t make me pick one.

[–] weeeeum@lemmy.world 8 points 2 weeks ago

"In the interest of user safety and security..."

Always before some dumb new draconian shit

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