Half of Americans consume almost no healthcare.

[American Horse]

Insurance companies work on a very small margin, maybe 6% compared to Apple that runs at over 40%, But, well, bitch all you want about mean old ins. companies. There's an app for that.

People are deluded into believing they can't afford health insurance and consequently they don't even check the market. If there's a scam, then that's it. It seems complicated so they don't read their insurance contract so they don't know what they are entitled to. I've bought in the individual market since I left Westinghouse in 1972 (up until medicare in 2006) and could always afford it for a family of three, no problem at all. And during all that time I was self employed with some years with no income at all because of real losses in spec homes I'd built and had to sell for less than I had in them.

We may be typical in that during that 35-years we only needed healthcare service a few times but when we did, the insurance companies took care of most of it, and what was left for us to pay was entirely manageable. Unlike some, I never saw paying in and getting nothing in return as being unfair. Just like home/hazard insurance, you may pay in for 35 years and never have a claim, and that is a good thing.

Try buying affordable HC insurance with a pre existing condition.

And do not even talk about COBRA it is a joke. $1,400 a month for me?

You know better than that. One does not need COBRA to buy health insurance for a preexisting condition.

My wife has an orphan disease that is also a preexisting conditon. Before age-qualifying for Medicare we were able to get her on the Indiana assigned risk insurance pool for 1/3 of what she was paying before. At the time she was 56 and got on with a $1500 deductible for $320 a month. That was ten years ago.

Indiana is friendly to insurance companies in that it doesn't over-regulate and mandate. That rate I quoted at the time was what participating carriers were willing to bid to get to operate in the state. Make it harder to operate in a state (Maine comes to mind) and rates will be higher and the number of carriers will diminish. Maine has what - two companies operating there now?

ED: And guess who advised her to get in the Indiana risk pool. It was the same company we were paying too much to before.

 

[chikenwing]

Insurance companies work on a very small margin, maybe 6% compared to Apple that runs at over 40%, But, well, bitch all you want about mean old ins. companies. There's an app for that.

People are deluded into believing they can't afford health insurance and consequently they don't even check the market. If there's a scam, then that's it. It seems complicated so they don't read their insurance contract so they don't know what they are entitled to. I've bought in the individual market since I left Westinghouse in 1972 (up until medicare in 2006) and could always afford it for a family of three, no problem at all. And during all that time I was self employed with some years with no income at all because of real losses in spec homes I'd built and had to sell for less than I had in them.

We may be typical in that during that 35-years we only needed healthcare service a few times but when we did, the insurance companies took care of most of it, and what was left for us to pay was entirely manageable. Unlike some, I never saw paying in and getting nothing in return as being unfair. Just like home/hazard insurance, you may pay in for 35 years and never have a claim, and that is a good thing.

Try buying affordable HC insurance with a pre existing condition.

And do not even talk about COBRA it is a joke. $1,400 a month for me?

And there is the rub!

With a 3k deductible, 20k a year is not possible for many.