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Mean and Nasty Gringos


Mijo

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2 hours ago, Ferret said:

Especially in winter? 🤣

Ferret, I can't pull your chain, now can I? Exactly my response had I been challenged. Like your style!

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5 hours ago, RVGRINGO said:

Even though I use the VA Health System, and my wife has Medicare and Medicare Advantate, we still pay 1/3 of our income for our medical care, in the form of copays, and the deductions from our Social Security. 

Oh, yes, emergency rooms will take you, but you will have a bill for at least a couple of thousand dollars, and it will remain due and payable, with hounding and possible liens.  Yet, in other counties there would be no bill, or an insignificant one.  Once, abroad, I was treated in an emergency room and the bill was $2 for the x-ray film.  Nothing more.  I was a tourist.  Later, I had the opportunity to get to know more about the systems in many other countries.  The USA could do well to emulate many of them.  Our 'for profit system' is out of control.

What?  We have Medicare and a supplemental, Humana, and an ER visit is $90.  Never more and my spouse has been admitted (including the ICU) several times.  We have never had to pay anything like thousands.  But I agree the US medical system sucks.

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27 minutes ago, Kyle said:

El Munudo What do you and your wife together pay monthly for Medicare and Humana?  I would bet most average Americsn couple could not afford those premiums.  Luck you

I think adding the extra for Humana was $76  each per month.  We picked a mid grade plan.  There were some for less and others more.  It includes drug coverage too.  FYI you need a US address.

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13 hours ago, Kyle said:

El Munudo What do you and your wife together pay monthly for Medicare and Humana?  I would bet most average Americsn couple could not afford those premiums.  Luck you

In Finland they pay 80% of their income in taxes, the health care is good, but many get private health care as the wait is long. As it is in many other countries such as Germany and Canada for instance. However, the Socialist Government is failing. Soon there will be no health care or anything else.

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El Menudo,

I was referring to "you who may be uninsured, and not with the VA".  My recent ER bills, and the 911 ambulance rides, were in the thousands.  Fortunately, for me, the VA covered it.  Someone without the VA and/or Medicare, or very expensive private insurance, would be facing a very large bill, plus the subsequent five days in the hospital, etc.

Had I been uninsured, I would not have called 911, and would choose to expire, rather than possibly bankrupt my surviving spouse.

However, since the indigent have nothing to lose, they use the ER for splinter removals.

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47 minutes ago, luvsdawgs said:

In Finland they pay 80% of their income in taxes, the health care is good, but many get private health care as the wait is long. As it is in many other countries such as Germany and Canada for instance. However, the Socialist Government is failing. Soon there will be no health care or anything else.

https://www.nordisketax.net/main.asp?url=files/suo/eng/i07.asp

Income taxes in Finland are about 50 percent maximum and 36 percent for $25,400 to $43,500  per year. Not bad.

. Their VAT [IVA] tax is high at 20 percent. 

Finland:

Income tax table, state income tax on earned income, for 2019

(In addition to the rates below, municipal and church taxes and the health insurance contribution will be collected at 18-26 %)

Earned income, euro

Tax at the lower limit, euro

Tax rate for amounts exceeding the lower limit, %

17 600 - 26 400

8,00

6,00

25 400 - 43 500

 536,00

17,25

43 500 - 76 100

3 485,75

21,25

76 100 -  

10 413,25

31,25

 

Income tax table, state income tax on earned income only, for 2018

(In addition to the rates below, municipal and church taxes and the health insurance contribution will be collected at 18-26 %)

Earned income, euro

Tax at the lower limit, euro

Tax rate for amounts exceeding the lower limit, %

17 200 to 25,700

8,00

6.00

25,700 to 42, 400

518.00

17.25

42,400 to 74,200

3,398.75

21.25

over 74,200

10,156.25

31.25

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On 8/1/2019 at 11:21 AM, jayc1ay said:

You will never succeed in changing the negative, ugly connotations in English and Spanish of the term "gringo." Why not just stop using it?

 

Some of us Gringos don't mind being called it in the least. PC has not overtaken everyone...thank God.  We even used to tell jokes until everyone was offended by everything. Some of us do still tell jokes...believe it or not.

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30 minutes ago, pappysmarket said:

Some of us Gringos don't mind being called it in the least. PC has not overtaken everyone...thank God.  We even used to tell jokes until everyone was offended by everything. Some of us do still tell jokes...believe it or not.

IMHO, as Bette Midler put it. "F....'em if they can't take a joke". When a person takes themselves too seriously, it's going to get in the way of enjoying expat life.  I know good and well how some of my Mexican friends and neighbors probably refer to a light skinned, blue eyed person who moved into their midst.  ...and then, there's my "handle". In other words, lighten up and you'll have a better time living here among a people with a highly developed sense of humor.🙃

You get respect for your accomplishments and deeds.  Any other "respect" is an illusion.

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24 minutes ago, gringal said:

IMHO, as Bette Midler put it. "F....'em if they can't take a joke". When a person takes themselves too seriously, it's going to get in the way of enjoying expat life.  I know good and well how some of my Mexican friends and neighbors probably refer to a light skinned, blue eyed person who moved into their midst.  ...and then, there's my "handle". In other words, lighten up and you'll have a better time living here among a people with a highly developed sense of humor.🙃

You get respect for your accomplishments and deeds.  Any other "respect" is an illusion.

When somebody shouts gringo at me, I reply: "oh NO, que horrible, dónde está ?" (while looking around me).

It usually makes them smile, and I dont care what they call me.  I have actually been called a lot worse. ...   a different subject, inappropriate for this webboard

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I never had anyone call me gringa in my face. The only time I hear gringo or gringa is from foreigners so maybe they should stop using the word.. I think the use of the word is way more spread out in the north than in the south  as well.  Yesterday I heard the word "ladino" used by an indigenous for the first time, when talking about non indigenous..she just used it to describe a group and did not mean t in a pejorative way but I was told down here to never use the word.. so I thought it was interesting..

People refer to each other sometimes by the color of their skin or nationality or whatever for expediency and do not mean anything by it...but you never know how whatever word will be received.. I think Rony has the right attitude about it. just laugh with the people rather than at people..

 

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8 minutes ago, lakeside7 said:

I have to chuckle at the "chatting " that goes for expert opinion mostly from people who NOB would be a non entity..Lakeside a Payton Place in spades

Peyton Place was a book, movie, and then a tv series about an outwardly prim and proper New England town that seethed below the surface with sex and violence. Nothing about “chatting” or expert opinions from former non-entities. 

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38 minutes ago, lakeside7 said:

I have to chuckle at the "chatting " that goes for expert opinion mostly from people who NOB would be a non entity..Lakeside a Payton Place in spades

You are the pot calling the kettle black. You should be chuckling at yourself obviously. IMO

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40 minutes ago, AlanMexicali said:

"Ladino" means English speaking Indigenous person.

Does being a "Gringo" automaticaly put you in the "Fifi" category? If so then we are in trouble as of lately.

Sorry, Ladino is many things but not an English speaking indigenous person.  As an adjective it means "astute, tricky, underhanded"; as a language it is the language spoken by Sephardic Jews; it is also a group of people who live in the northern part of Italy (near Bolzano); and in Mexico (but more Central America) it is used to describe a group of people who speak the indigenous language as well as Spanish, but who are not yet assimilated into the main mestizo culture.

https://definicion.de/ladino/

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