Do you have employer-provided health care? Do you have any idea how much it costs? Do you know how much money your employer pays into it? Have your premiums and/or co-pays gone up recently? Have you seen lower percentage raises recently? And, do you remember how many options you had in providers?
If you bought insurance on your own, how much did it cost? Is it a family or individual plan?
If you are uninsured, have you priced out what it would cost you to buy insurance?
I work for local government, so our benefits are pretty good. However, the price is extortionate. I have my girlfriend on my plan, and our monthly premium is about $850. Now, fortunately, my employer pays all of that; when my girlfriend was on her work’s insurance, she paid $300 a month for it. Before this current job I bought insurance privately; it was bare bones, with a deductible for brand name medication–which meant buying meds over the internet for me!–and a high copayment. By the end I was paying $250 a month for that. I’m not saying I’ll jump on the public option if it makes it out of Congress, but I’ll be glad to have that as a fallback position.
sends me a letter each year that shows how much they spent on me, with health benefits, retirement, wellness, vision, etc. all broken out. It certainly adds a lot to the base salary. I reckon they think it will help with the union negotiations.
What the hell is a “raise”?
At this point, I think it’s defined as a “job,” period.
I’m with Zandar re: raises….
I’m paying out more than $700/mo on health insurance (Health/medical, Dental, VSP) for me, my wife, and daughter…so individually, I guess it’s not as bad for me as for others…
Unemployed for 9 months therefore uninsured.
58 yo. No pre existing conditions except for a hysterectomy 7 years ago. High blood pressure on and off.
$800 a month. Been insured all my life.
That’s more than half my rent, and the equivalent of two car payments (or more, depending on the car) per month. Wow.
I am an employee of the USPS. My BCBS family policy costs me $110.72 every two weeks. I have been told that this is 40% of the total premium.
Yes, premiums go up substantially every year. Raises are non-existent. We had COLA but the government claims that COL is going down, not up.
I’m a postal retiree. About $150 a month coming out of my thin gruel. It’s Kaiser, good care, $15 an appointment co-pay, the cost of meds is up a bit.
You must be single, Bob. It’s going to cost me $355 out of my pension of about $600.
The husband and I are uninsured and 61 years old. We got a quote from BCBS in the last month or so and they wanted $1800 per month with a $2500 annual deductible and high co-pays. The online quote was based just on our age and didn’t take into account our pre-existing conditions which, of course, wouldn’t be covered so the policy would be essentially useless to us.
I don’t want affordable health insurance. I want affordable health CARE! sputter… mutter… mumble… groan.
I have health insurance through my employer. I think our health coverage is pretty good compared to what I hear other people are dealing with. Best I can tell my premiums run about $1200 a month. My portion is about $200.
I’ve been with the same employer going on 25 years now. Premiums have gone up I think every year. They’re up about 3% over last year.
I’m 58 and things are beginning to break down. I have half a dozen things wrong with me, healthwise. I fairly certain that if I didn’t have insurance through my employer I would be uninsurable. If I could get insurance on my own I doubt I would be able to pay the premiums.
I live in Canada so I’m on a (commie pinko socialist fascist baby Jesus hating evil marxist) single payer system (that makes the baby Jesus cry). I pay about $50/month quarterly and the only reason I pay that much is because I’m in (or at least was) in high income bracket. I don’t have any deductible at all and I don’t pay anything beyond the aforementioned quarterly payments. Oh yeah, I can see any damn doctor I please too.
I also have private insurance (through work) for covering prescription drugs, acupuncture, massage therapy, physiotherapy, dentistry, etc. but that’s only about $25/month.
Sorry, I’ll go back to my igloo now.
Oh yeah, I can also claim most of the meds, acupuncture, message therapy, physiotherapy, dentistry, etc. that isn’t covered by insurance on my taxes so the uncovered left overs are, mostly, a cash flow issue rather than a cash issue.
Can you be my sponsor if I move to Canada???
lol
me too….;o)
I’m still on my estranged husband’s policy through IBM. It’s gone up about 30% over the past 6 years and his payment is about $500 a month…with IBM paying the rest, but I have no idea how much that is.
When the divorce is final, I’m out of luck. But I’ve been uninsured more in my life than I’ve been insured. You just hope nothing major happens, and you don’t go to doctors unless it’s obviously something serious.
I’m unemployed; until now I’ve been paying the COBRA rate of 370/month, now that’s over and the best “conversion” rate from my HMO is 490. ugh. that’s for a single male, 48.
I was laid off from my job when I was 59. I stayed with the company’s COBRA plan for the full 18 months but started looking for alternatives several months before it ended. An individual BC/BS bare bones plan at our age was quoted as $1300 a month. I did some research & learned that part of the HIPAA bill states that if you finish COBRA, the insurer of last resort in your state has to accept you at community ratings without taking age or health condition into account. I argued with BC/BS for two months before they admitted that there was such a requirement, but the bottom line was that the same bare bones policy dropped down to just over $300 a month, saving us about$12,000 a year! Having hit the magic age of 65, we’re both now enrolled in Blue Care Network Advantage at $76 a month over the money taken out of our SS checks each month (total somewhere between $170 & $175.)
I have Pennsylvania’s state-subsidized health insurance called AdultBasic, administered by BCBS Keystone Health Plan East. There are income limits to qualify. Premiums are $35/month if you’re lucky enough to get in, around $315/month if you qualify but are on the waiting list. No deductible. $10 – $25 copays. Not managed care. Great benefits, excluding dental, vision, and mental health (prescriptions at a discount).
For dental insurance, check out some of the discount plans like Aetna and GE Wellness (there are others). You pay about $150/year, and as long as you go to a dentist who accepts the plan, your services will be significantly discounted, with no cap, no deductible. It’s not insurance. There’s no approval. You just get the same services at huge discounts. I went to my dentist for years before discovering that I could have been paying less than half for the same procedures and getting my exams and x-rays for free. The best dentists may not accept these, but if money determines your dental care, it’s a great deal better than going without any.
I’m pretty sure my boss pays around $1200 per month for me and my daughter. He covers me 100% so that is cool. However, I have a $500 deductible and pay $40 co-pay for every doctor visit. When my daughter was hit by a car last year (her fault) and spent three days in the hospital, we ended up paying over $4,000. That was a far cry from the $20,000 bill, but still. I was lucky to be able to pay, but it wiped my college savings account, adding more stress to me as to how I am going to pay for her college.
But, let’s see, 1200/mo x 12 = 14,400 x 6 year (the time I have been employed in this job) = 86,400 and the total amount they have paid in this period could not possible top $40K (and is likely less), so they made 46K profit off of me and nearly bankrupted me in the process.
I’d seriously consider going on Medicare if such were ever offered to me.
My health-plan:
I live in Fr**.
You’re Number 1!
We’re Number 37 🙁
thank you for the link. I enjoyed so much that video.
For a very reasonable hourly fee, I’m available and happy to expound on any of the truly terrible things for which France can (and should) be roundly and rightly condemned.
Meanwhile, here’s a genuinely true story I have direct from a very reliable source—
it’s a Sunday morning and, after passing a truly miserable second night in acute pain, the story’s protagonist (herein after ‘the patient’) arises and goes next door to a neighbor’s and explains that he’s concerned that there’s something wrong and it may require medical attention. The neighbors invite him to stretch out on the sofa and promptly call “SOS Médecin” which is a house-call doctor service. Within twenty mintues, an M.D. arrives and examines the ‘patient’, writes a referal order and sends the patient to the emergency room of a major hospital within twenty minutes of the residence. (The kindly neighbors drive the patient there.) Total cost of the house-call (which is a flat rate fee): 50€ cash, paid by patient on the spot.
At the emergency room, (on a Sunday late morning) the patient (who has a French national health care card) waits about fifteen minutes before being taken into to an examining room. There, he explains the sitaution and presents the SOS médecin’s referal note. There’s lots of questions, checking, poking and pushing (because the trouble relates to an abdominal “mid-line” protrusion). The two examining room physicins disappear a while, come back later and try some more pushing and poking. When nothing works, they recommend that the patient be admitted for surgery that same afternoon. With the patient’s assent, he’s admitted, prepped and taken into pre-surgery. There are more tests; he meets the operating crew, and, within less than two and a half hours of coming into the emergency room, he’s under anesthesia and being operated on. After post-op recovery, he’s taken to a two-bed room, however, since the other bed is vacant, it’s in effect a private room. He spends that night and the next (or was it two?) in the hospital; After being examined on the morning of the second day (or third?), he’s discharged.
Costs incurred: 8€ (for the television– which was viewed but could have been declined, costing nothing).
Other than that, the total fees for the entire affair, from emergency room admittance to discharge, including the two nights (or three?) in an unshared room :
Zero €. “0” The costs were covered at 100% by the health service.
Disabled, was on COBRA until September 15th; premium was well over $1400 a month for me, my wife, and two children. My ex-company’s group insurer was out of state, so no continuing with them. Called BC/BS of Maryland; was bluntly told we would be declined coverage because of pre-existing conditions (mine and my children’s).
I heard about the Maryland Health Insurance Plan from my sister-in-law. MHIP offers insurance for those who can’t get it otherwise. Coming off of 18 months of COBRA makes you automatically eligible. We were approved, but I’m still waiting for the premium letter; I think the premium will be about $700/month. (They initially sent me a premium letter for individual coverage for myself. I had to contact them and explain that our application clearly stated family coverage.) Downside: MHIP is administered by Carefirst (BS/BS of Maryland). We’ll see how this works out; of course, I believe it was the only option available to us given our pre-existing conditions.
I get Anthem Blue Cross through my employer. $35 co-pay, $500 deductible, medical coverage only.
Our county government self-insures up to around 25K per employee, then above that an underwriter takes over the payments. The coverage is 80/20 with 500 deductible per individual and costs $108 per month for family coverage. Generic Rx is a flat $10. K-Mart give me a 90 day supply of 2 commonly prescribed meds for $10 each. For non-generics, hold on to your wallet. The average cost to the county per employee is around $9,000 per year. After payroll, its the largest item in the budget.
This is good coverage for most common medical problems, but look out if you have a family member who is diagnosed with so-called “mental health” disorders. We ran into this wall quite a few years back and found ourselves quickly in debt for $20K and in collections with the hospital 90 days after discharge. I fought with the medical claims people for 6 months to get anything at all from them and eventually got about 50% of the bills paid.
Had Employer paid insurance until company closed doors beginning of Sept. Company paid $365 for my insurance. Because Cobra is company driven it was not available to me after being laid off. We had had a choice of 2 different companies and 2 plans within each company. I have cancer. Pre existing pretty serious issue for me.
My boss personally worked with rep to get me on a sister health insurance company that would take me because of a exemption clause in the policy.
I got an email last week that I was accepted. Haven’t gotten a bill or a card yet so am still on pins and needles. The new policy I’m told will run at the same $365, no vision or dental. Of course I have to start over with this years’ deductible.
The sheer terror of not having insurance on top of no job is indescribible.
Self-employed. We pay around $1300 a month for the family. That’s with substantial deductibles.
We had to buy insurance for our daughter, who attends college in Massachusetts. I understand, though I haven’t seen the bill, that it costs $250 a year, since my husband is a federal employee. We also bought into the health clinic at her school, so she can have a convenient alternative for minor matters, at around $150 per year.
That may seem like a small amount, but it is a lot more than we pay as residents of Great Britain. We pay £0 per year for our health care, including my vision care as I am blind as a bat.
I do pay for dental care, since there are no NHS dentists in my area and I understand the waiting times for dental care are very long. But that costs less than dentists in the US, since UK dentists have fewer years of training than is standard in the US.
I work for a small (about 20 people) business. We have Blue Cross/Blue Shield. The company pays all of my premiums, I’m not sure what the amount is. A couple of years ago, we had to move to a high-deductible plan to keep costs down (and to be able to offer an affordable family plan to those that need it). Because my employers are extremely generous, they also pay into a HSA for each employee, to cover the annual $2000 deductible. I think my copays are about $10-15, haven’t been to a doctor recently. Our plan also includes some dental and vision, which helps a lot.
Every year they have to re-negotiate the plan, and it’s a struggle to keep the costs down. I don’t know what will happen this year.
A robust public option would be a HUGE help to a company like ours, and we’re small enough to qualify, I think, under some of the plans being discussed.
How does one find out what my company pays for my health insurance each year?
You probably could go to Human Resources and ask them. They won’t be offended.