This is a much-needed perspective, thank you for sharing! It sounds similar in many ways to my experience with prenatal health care in Germany. Universally available without co-pays, yes, but also not as "fancy" as the concierge care that many of my relatives in the US are now used to. Also, abortion here is allowed during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, with a requirement to obtain counseling beforehand. Interestingly, doctors will not reveal the baby's sex until after 12 weeks to prevent sex-selective abortion. Sad but apparently necessary.
All the best to you for your upcoming birth and postpartum period. Looking forward to reading Parts 2 and 3!
Thanks for the comment Kelsey! Yes, I have friends in the US with more fancy care who think my prenatal healthcare is lacking, yet I have other friends who are envious that I have no co-pays. Personally, I prefer not to have so many medical appointments, exams and tests, but can see why some Americans like their fancy care.
Great point about abortion counseling, something I didn’t include. In some reproductive health activist circles in the US, receiving mandatory counseling on abortion is considered a psychological restriction on access. From what I read about policy in Norway, medical counseling is mandated and emotional /psychological counseling is optional.
I actually went to one of those counselling places when I got (unexpectedly) pregnant with my first. Not because I wanted an abortion, but because I had no clue about how the whole system worked, and they give advice on all aspects of family planning. They were incredibly empathetic and helpful!
This was super interesting, even if I am not pregnant and not from either country! Most importantly, I hope that your birth goes so incredibly well and I'll be thinking of you. :)
Christina - this is so so fascinating, thanks for sharing! So cool to hear about the differences. To the point on “late term abortions” - usually in the US the majority of these are wanted pregnancies that are terminated due to discovered medical issues with the fetus, ie some condition where the fetus would not survive outside of the womb after birth. Do you have any sense on how these would be dealt with in Norway?
Hi Kathy, good question. The law is based on fetal viability, which is both determined by the age of the fetus, as well as specific medical conditions that would make the fetus non-viable outside the womb at later weeks like you describe.
I believe they pushed the limit up to 22 weeks after several babies in Norway were aborted later than that, and then survived several hours outside the womb after the abortion. In the past, later term abortions were granted for things like rape, but now the law is based on fetal viability alone (which is not only based on fetal age).
Fascinating, Christina. Thank you for sharing this. I'll be looking forward to future installments in this series.
You probably already know this, but at week 35, you're at a good point to get a DTaP vaccine and have your antibodies generated in response to the vaccine cross the placenta, protecting your baby for the first ~6 months or so. So, good job with that!
It might be outside your understanding, but adding more information about taxation/economics would help contextualize the cost piece, because it's easy to make "no out-of-pocket costs" seem better otherwise but you don't really know.
Hi, the tax code in the US is too complicated and too outside my wheelhouse (except for my own personal situation which is taking me years to figure out how to do a cost-benefit analysis on) for me to write about comparatively. To oversimplify something I really shouldn’t, middle class earners under 70k or so aren’t taxed too differently on income taxes in Norway the US vs. Norway. When you get to the upper middle class though, comparing pros and cons of Norwegian to American lifestyles gets much more complicated because A) there’s less of a ceiling to earn a higher salary in certain professions in the US and B) your healthcare costs really depend on the type of healthcare benefits your employer offers you (or doesn’t). As an individual American, which system you’d be happier with is going to be dependent on your salary and benefits in the US, as this varies so widely for each person.
Again, to generalize (as this doesn’t describe everybody), many American upper middle class earners (such as those who can earn 6 figures in the US) with Norwegian spouses often decide to stay in or move back to the US because of salary loss in Norway, not necessarily because of high taxes. People who earn 65k or less (such as teachers) seem to be less stressed and happy with Norway. If you’re very rich, living in Norway would be a bad financial decision due to the wealth tax (which sounds good to many in practice but is a huge mess in Norway logistically and has decreased tax revenue for the state because many of the richest people moved away to other EU countries).
However, there are also so many factors to consider when comparing places to live like cultural differences, crime, access to nature, whether you want to send your kids to private school, whether your kids are special needs… the list goes on and on and on. Therefore there is no way to say living in Norway over the US is a better financial decision overall, and the goal of these series of posts in not to give the impression that there is. And there is really no point in advertising Norway as a "better" place to live than US even if I wanted to, because most Americans cannot not logistically move to Norway. (Outside of marrying a Norwegian, it's very hard to to immigrate to Norway as it's not a country that is keen to hire foreign skilled workers outside of a few key industries). This is not the motive behind these posts.
Christina, this essay was excellent. Great work explaining your experience and Norway's nuances in a clear, approachable manner!
Your statement about analyzing taxes and budget is correct.
I work in policy communications, and some of my colleagues are tax/budget/entitlement experts (they testify before US Congress!), and it is *complicated*. Comparing two countries is extremely difficult and maybe even futile?
Yes, it completely comes down to the individual. What state you live in within the US and what industry do you work in are also big factors because cost of living and job opportunities vary so widely throughout the US.
I am, without a doubt, saving money on my prenatal healthcare in Norway. Am I saving money on every other aspect of my life in Norway? Nope!
This is a much-needed perspective, thank you for sharing! It sounds similar in many ways to my experience with prenatal health care in Germany. Universally available without co-pays, yes, but also not as "fancy" as the concierge care that many of my relatives in the US are now used to. Also, abortion here is allowed during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, with a requirement to obtain counseling beforehand. Interestingly, doctors will not reveal the baby's sex until after 12 weeks to prevent sex-selective abortion. Sad but apparently necessary.
All the best to you for your upcoming birth and postpartum period. Looking forward to reading Parts 2 and 3!
Thanks for the comment Kelsey! Yes, I have friends in the US with more fancy care who think my prenatal healthcare is lacking, yet I have other friends who are envious that I have no co-pays. Personally, I prefer not to have so many medical appointments, exams and tests, but can see why some Americans like their fancy care.
Great point about abortion counseling, something I didn’t include. In some reproductive health activist circles in the US, receiving mandatory counseling on abortion is considered a psychological restriction on access. From what I read about policy in Norway, medical counseling is mandated and emotional /psychological counseling is optional.
I actually went to one of those counselling places when I got (unexpectedly) pregnant with my first. Not because I wanted an abortion, but because I had no clue about how the whole system worked, and they give advice on all aspects of family planning. They were incredibly empathetic and helpful!
That’s cool to hear! I had no idea how the system worked when I first got pregnant and was a bit scared. But I am really happy with it so far.
TBD how labor and delivery goes!
This was super interesting, even if I am not pregnant and not from either country! Most importantly, I hope that your birth goes so incredibly well and I'll be thinking of you. :)
Thank you Emily!
Christina - this is so so fascinating, thanks for sharing! So cool to hear about the differences. To the point on “late term abortions” - usually in the US the majority of these are wanted pregnancies that are terminated due to discovered medical issues with the fetus, ie some condition where the fetus would not survive outside of the womb after birth. Do you have any sense on how these would be dealt with in Norway?
Hi Kathy, good question. The law is based on fetal viability, which is both determined by the age of the fetus, as well as specific medical conditions that would make the fetus non-viable outside the womb at later weeks like you describe.
I believe they pushed the limit up to 22 weeks after several babies in Norway were aborted later than that, and then survived several hours outside the womb after the abortion. In the past, later term abortions were granted for things like rape, but now the law is based on fetal viability alone (which is not only based on fetal age).
Makes sense and thank you for explaining! ❤️
Fascinating, Christina. Thank you for sharing this. I'll be looking forward to future installments in this series.
You probably already know this, but at week 35, you're at a good point to get a DTaP vaccine and have your antibodies generated in response to the vaccine cross the placenta, protecting your baby for the first ~6 months or so. So, good job with that!
thank you! I already got it :)
It might be outside your understanding, but adding more information about taxation/economics would help contextualize the cost piece, because it's easy to make "no out-of-pocket costs" seem better otherwise but you don't really know.
Hi, the tax code in the US is too complicated and too outside my wheelhouse (except for my own personal situation which is taking me years to figure out how to do a cost-benefit analysis on) for me to write about comparatively. To oversimplify something I really shouldn’t, middle class earners under 70k or so aren’t taxed too differently on income taxes in Norway the US vs. Norway. When you get to the upper middle class though, comparing pros and cons of Norwegian to American lifestyles gets much more complicated because A) there’s less of a ceiling to earn a higher salary in certain professions in the US and B) your healthcare costs really depend on the type of healthcare benefits your employer offers you (or doesn’t). As an individual American, which system you’d be happier with is going to be dependent on your salary and benefits in the US, as this varies so widely for each person.
Again, to generalize (as this doesn’t describe everybody), many American upper middle class earners (such as those who can earn 6 figures in the US) with Norwegian spouses often decide to stay in or move back to the US because of salary loss in Norway, not necessarily because of high taxes. People who earn 65k or less (such as teachers) seem to be less stressed and happy with Norway. If you’re very rich, living in Norway would be a bad financial decision due to the wealth tax (which sounds good to many in practice but is a huge mess in Norway logistically and has decreased tax revenue for the state because many of the richest people moved away to other EU countries).
However, there are also so many factors to consider when comparing places to live like cultural differences, crime, access to nature, whether you want to send your kids to private school, whether your kids are special needs… the list goes on and on and on. Therefore there is no way to say living in Norway over the US is a better financial decision overall, and the goal of these series of posts in not to give the impression that there is. And there is really no point in advertising Norway as a "better" place to live than US even if I wanted to, because most Americans cannot not logistically move to Norway. (Outside of marrying a Norwegian, it's very hard to to immigrate to Norway as it's not a country that is keen to hire foreign skilled workers outside of a few key industries). This is not the motive behind these posts.
Christina, this essay was excellent. Great work explaining your experience and Norway's nuances in a clear, approachable manner!
Your statement about analyzing taxes and budget is correct.
I work in policy communications, and some of my colleagues are tax/budget/entitlement experts (they testify before US Congress!), and it is *complicated*. Comparing two countries is extremely difficult and maybe even futile?
Yes, it completely comes down to the individual. What state you live in within the US and what industry do you work in are also big factors because cost of living and job opportunities vary so widely throughout the US.
I am, without a doubt, saving money on my prenatal healthcare in Norway. Am I saving money on every other aspect of my life in Norway? Nope!