My grocery store’s frozen crap has never been as good, interesting, or inexpensive as it is at Trader Joe’s. It’s not that the stuff there is great or cheap, but there’s a bit of variety that is harder to find in the Krogers and Safeways and they do switch things up so every few months there are new options. For me, between variety and C quality, vs the same basic American stuff and somewhere between F to B quality, I’ll take the former. That’s why I don’t really get frozen stuff at Costco.
The HMO format of insurance is not uncommon, but Kaiser does have a somewhat unique implementation of it. Most HMO insurances contract with healthcare providers (network) and you are only allowed to go to them. Kaiser is not the healthcare provider but it is a consortium with the medical groups, hospitals, and insurance, such that they appear as one big entity. This can create conflicts of interest, but it also creates some huge efficiencies. Everyone from GPs to specialists to pharmacy is all in the same system, so there are not issues with communication between different companies and hospitals. The also have more incentive than most insurance companies to keep you healthy to prevent you from using the more expensive types of care. In my experience, for the same premiums, KP tends to have the lowest out of pocket max and no/low deductibles compared to PPOs like Cigna or Blue Cross/Shield.
This idea that to be stable or put down roots means buying a single family home in the suburbs is one of the biggest problems in America. Because of this idea, there’s so little high quality medium density housing designed for families in cities, which only reinforces this idea. It causes people spread out, they isolate, they use more energy to live and commute, they don’t have experiences with a diverse group of people.