…or you live in a normal country, where you have universal health insurance, giving birth is free, and you get a free parenting starter-kit and counseling
Lesson 1: Don’t shake the baby.
Lesson 2: I said DON’T shake the baby!!!
How do you pay the doctors if the healthcare is free?
Checkmate communists.
Why should you pay for it, it’s free!
Checkmate euh, logical people I guess.
$418 in 1961 is about $4,438 in 2025.
I searched and the average cost for a vaginal birth in 2025 is about $13,000.
EDIT: I looked up The Long Island College Hospital and it seems like it was replaced by NYU Langone Long Island (also a teaching hospital). The bottom line is that you might be near $0 out of pocket there, as it was in 1961.
Wat? Are you saying that people who give birth in a hospital are sent a 13 000 USD bill afterwards? Like, is that actually what happens? I feel like I have to ask, because I actually cannot comprehend that being the case.
What if you don’t have the money? Do they expect you to just hold it in until you’ve saved up? Or do they just prefer that people give birth at home with no access to medical care if something goes wrong? What if something does go wrong and you call an ambulance, du they bill you for that afterwards as well? What if you have no money for that either? Just… die?
If you don’t have the money you get debt. At some point in a hospital visit a person swings by to get your financial information. They can’t refuse care, but they can demand your info.
If you can’t pay your bill that’s totally ok, it’ll sit there waiting as debt collectors hound you every few days. Or you can reach out to a hospital run charity program to prove you’re sufficiently poor and get a reduced cost payment plan.
It’s dystopian, yes, but more in the “a lot of Americans go into medical bankruptcy” way than the “you’re forced to give birth out back” way.
If you can’t pay then they’ll put the baby back in
Are you saying that people who give birth in a hospital are sent a 13 000 USD bill afterwards?
Without insurance? Yes, it can be that or more.
What if you don’t have the money?
No hospital will refuse service in case of an emergency. I believe that it is actually illegal. They will send you a bill afterwards though.
What if something does go wrong and you call an ambulance, du they bill you for that afterwards as well?
Absolutely. For a lot of money in some cases. Do a search for ambulance service cost in the US and you will find a few horror stories.
What if you have no money for that either? Just… die?
Ambulances cannot refuse service in case of emergency, but they will invoice you later.
Even with insurance, many plans have a deductible that requires you to pay the first couple grand on your own before they’ll cover anything, and even once you’ve paid that amount they will require you to cover a couple hundred per day of hospital stay (doubled for two patients: mom + baby).
It is entirely normal to pay thousands of dollars for a normal uncomplicated hospital birth even with insurance.
This is 100% correct. My plan has a $10,000 yearly deductible, which means that every year I am responsible for the first $10,000 of medical expenses.
This sounds so dystopian I’m having a hard time comprehending it… what happens when they provide the mandatory emergency care and invoice someone who just doesn’t have the money to pay?
And to expand on the other answers you received, it’s hilarious (and perhaps old now… I saw something about medical debt now being counted on credit scores and I’m sure attacks have been made on medical debts in general) that the advice typically given was to NEVER make a payment on any medical debt, because that counted as a commitment towards paying, and the laws that eventually made medical debts go away no longer applied, so the debt companies would have more ammunition to use against you in court.
It is dystopian, but there arr plenty of programs to mitigate the issue. If you go to a charity or teaching hospital (like the one referenced in the post), and you have no insurance, your bill might be mostly forgiven if not entirely written off. Emergency rooms cannot refuse service and if you are broke, they might write it off. More than likely they will sell off the debt to a third party for a small fraction and those guys will hound you for life. Again, if you are poor, plan ahead (teaching or charity hospital) and you should be fine.
PS: I am sure you have heard of Planned Parenthood due to the GOP’s crusade against abortion. The real thing to note is that they offer pre and post natal services to make sure that mother and child are healthy, free of charge. Every time a Planned Parenthood clinic is forced to close, those services disappear for the poor.
And in the rare case where they do not forgive the debt and you do not pay, at some point they write it off for the tax break.
I’m sure they write it off at the original invoiced amount without any discounts so that their tax deduction for you not paying is probably equal to or greater than what they would have made had you paid it.
They expect you to have the baby in a manger full of farm animals on a pile of hay, like Jesus’s mom.
People living under the bridge have to come from somewhere
Approximately $800 after inflation.
