Have you ever donated to someone’s GoFundMe campaign? Perhaps scrolled by a tweet or Facebook post asking people to donate to someone’s surgery or medication cost? According to a new survey from the nonpartisan NORC at the University of Chicago, an estimated 8 million American adults have created crowdfunding campaigns for themselves (or someone in their household) to pay for health treatments or medical bills. A full 20% of adults say they’ve donated to someone else’s crowdfunding effort, which, put another way, is about 50 million people.
Given that medical debt is one of the top reasons people file for bankruptcy, crowdfunding medical costs makes sense, but the numbers are a big reminder that we need health care reform—and soon.
Even with insurance, deductibles, co-pays, and out-of-pocket costs can be staggering. So, what do people do? In addition to second jobs, selling belongings, moving in with family, and a variety of other methods to make it work, people turn to the internet to crowdfund health care costs.
Before we dig into more numbers, here’s some background on the survey. It was conducted between Nov. 8 and 16, 2019. According to the release, the survey included a nationally representative sample of Americans age 18 and over, with 1,020 interviews in total. You can check out the methodology details here.
35% of survey respondents say they donated to the campaign of someone they didn’t know, while 61% said they donated to a relative’s campaign. 46% said they donated to a friend’s effort, while nearly one-quarter said they donated to an acquaintance's. Less than 20% said they donated to coworkers’ campaigns.
While there is absolutely no moral failing when it comes to filing for bankruptcy (or being in any sort of debt), the capitalist system can make trying to have your debt forgiven an extremely stressful process. The reason most people file for bankruptcy? Health problems. A recent study discovered that over 66% of bankruptcies are because of taking time away from work because of health issues and the enormous cost of care.
Even before it gets to bankruptcy status, medical debt can be overwhelming. A 2018 study published in Health Affairs found that one in six Americans have overdue medical bills listed on their credit reports, and over half of those past-due bills were under $600 a pop. According to this study, millennials are more likely than older generations to have overdue medical bills. Given how few people can cover emergencies that require more than $400 in cash, this, again, isn’t surprising. But it can be suffocating for people just trying to survive.
Is this crowdfunding trend likely to change? As Mollie Hertel, a senior research scientist at NORC suggests, it’s not looking good. “As annual out-of-pocket costs continue to rise, more Americans are struggling to pay their medical bills,” Hertel said in the press release. “Although about a quarter of Americans report having sponsored or donated to a campaign, this share is likely to increase in the face of rising premiums and out-of-pocket costs.”
What could help? Affordable, accessible health care for everybody. Even, for example, free health care for all. Relatedly, Sen. Bernie Sanders has proposed eliminating $81 billion in medical debt, as well as creating regulations about debt calls and harassment.