Photo: Suntrap/Getty Images In the summer of 2018, everything came together for Don Lee: The bartender, who had already been labeled a “legend” in the industry, opened his own bar, Existing Conditions. In August, he got married, and his bar — which he opened with partners Dave Arnold and Greg Boehm — was receiving serious critical acclaim. Then, in November, Lee went to the hospital. He suspected he had bronchitis and wanted to get antibiotics.
Yet Lee’s diagnosis and treatment bring into sharp focus the precariousness of the bar industry’s labor force. One in six Americans carry medical debt, and health care is the number-one cause of personal bankruptcy in this country: According to a 2014 study, 43 million Americans have unpaid medical debt, and a 2019 study suggests it’s only gotten worse.
Mix stayed on her parents’ insurance until she was 25, and was off it for a total of two to three years. During her uninsured years, Mix got into a bike accident in Brooklyn, within sight of Woodhull Hospital, and had to fork over ambulance fees out of pocket. The total cost of that accident, she says, was around $13,000. Once she got insurance, she found out she had been living with an undiagnosed case of celiac disease.
David says that, before, she had gotten catastrophic insurance — after breaking her foot, paying for an E.R. visit out-of-pocket, and losing shifts when she couldn’t stand on her foot. The catastrophic option — low-cost insurance that only kicks in after some sort of extreme calamity — is something other bartenders point to as their one insurance option.
Teague broke his humerus bone in the accident and was unable to use his left arm, putting him out of work for six months. His medical expenses were covered by the driver’s insurance, but not yet the lost work. “I’ve never gotten any remuneration from my lost wages,” he says. “It’s still in litigation — two and a half years later.”