How much does health insurance cost?

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

On a group plan through work, our medical insurance costs $15,408 for the family this year. That includes both worker and employer contributions.

How much does your health insurance cost?

[jIM_Ohio]

~12k worker+employee (only costs me $1400/year)

[maat55]

We pay 210.00 per month, I don't know what the company pays.

[atomicrc11]

A family plan from my employer costs $15k per year, I end up paying $3200.

[momof1in150]

My DH is retired from the Navy and it costs us $430 per year for medical through the Tricare system.

If he were to get additional insurance through his work it would cost us $300-$350 a month for a family of 4.

[dmontngrey]

The best family plan here costs $14900 a year and the employee pays $5585 of that.

I'm on DH's plan though and it's MUCH less expensive.

[gamecock43]

I pay $90 a month for me alone. $1100 deductible-then 100% covered. But it does not include any pregnancy coverage.

[StressLess]

We've been paying $660 a month (or $7920 a year) for the high-deductible COBRA plan from DH's last job. That's $7920 a year, plus the first $5000 of expenses we might incur. This is for husband and wife only.

If the COBRA ran out before we were able to
get covered under another job, the cost of buying it ourselves would jump up to $919 a month with for the same high deductible policy--the only cheaper way to go would be to jump up to a $10,000 deductible policy for $794 a month. See the November price sheet from the state of NJ--

http://www.state.nj.us/dobi/division_insurance/ihcseh/ihcratepage_sp.pdf

As far as I'm concerned, McCain's idea of a health insurance tax credit of $5,000 is just a cruel joke. It would not nearly cover the cost of the cheapest insurance to begin with, and still leave us liable for huge deductibles.

[jIM_Ohio]

As far as I'm concerned, McCain's idea of a health insurance tax credit of $5,000 is just a cruel joke. It would not nearly cover the cost of the cheapest insurance to begin with, and still leave us liable for huge deductibles.

I initially thought the taxation of Health care benefits was bad. It actully made me think about voting for Obama. Then I thought about it more and realized a few things:

1) My biggest issue with health care is people want good care, but are not willing to pay for it. McCain's plan fits into the philosophy that all people will now know how much they pay for health care.

2) Most working people pay less than 5k per year for health care, so whatever they pay as payroll premiums is entirely refunded with the credit.

3) retired people which pay the whole 15k health care cost out of their retirement savings, now get a 5k tax credit to recoup some of this cost.

Retired people will like the 5k credit. Workers should not be affected. People which pay Cobra will see this as not enough, but my understanding is Cobra is a short term solution (a person cannot stay on Cobra for an indefinite period, can they?).

The second big problem with health care is that it is a pyramid scheme and neither candidate presented a plan to debunk the pyramid.

Young people are being asked to foot the bill for older people. Working people and insured people are being asked to foot the bill for older people and those which cannot afford to pay full price.

IMO national insurance would address some of this- it means everyone has insurance, so the price increases built into poor people not being able to pay would have some excess charges removed from the system.

example- My kids were in ICU for about 3 months from March-June this year (they were born 3 months early), The bill for them was around 100k per month. We saw the breakdown of the 100k on the explanation of benefits. $762/day for just the neonatologist for example- and that was just ONE of my boys. If you do that math, the spot ONE of my kids was in is worth $275k to the neonatalogist for the full year. This 275k covers the people do not have insurance but the law requires the hospital provide care to patients regardless. It was obvious to wife and me that many of the kids there either had absent parents, parents with substance problems, or other financial issues. If I had to guess- maybe 10-33% of the beds (there are probably 200 beds in this NICU) had kids which we never saw parents visit (and my wife would be at hospital from 8am-5pm and we would go back 7pm-10pm when I got home from work).

My theory is if hospital knew it could recover costs from each bed that 275k price tag per bed (per year) might decrease to 200k or 150k. That lowers what each insurance company would be paying to the hospital for their respective patient.

I also keep in mind the neonatologist is paid when my kids were admitted. We also need to follow up with that neonatologist for first 2 years of their life (every month for first 3 months, then 6 months, then maybe 2 more times) and I would assume the fee also subsidized some of the follow up visits, even though I also know there are charges for the follow up visits too.


The tax credit will help people see the issue better, IMO. It is not a direct solution, but most people in this country which get health care from an employer would not see anything change with the taxation of health care (because most people are paying less than the 5k credit for health coverage now anyway). The only people which get health care pre-tax are workers, retirees need to fund their own healthcare until eligible for medicare and these retirees get nothing- no tax credit from government, nothing on schedule A for the premiums they pay either.

[MonkeyMama]

$9k including our out-of-pocket maximum. In a good year we would only pay $6k (just the premiums). Worst case if $9k if we maxed out our deductible. (Which in general we do - doesn't take much).

We don't have employer insurance. Private insurance - I have had it since I was 22 because none of my employers (big or small) have ever offered better coverage. It was considerably cheaper when I Was single, of course.

$5k would be sweet for people like me (the McCain credit). But not for the masses with employer coverage.

BTW, I just read an article that something like 75% small businesses don't offer health insurance to their employees. Uh, yeah. This is not news to me. These are the people who would benefit from McCain's plan. (Though personally I am wary how it would work and how it would be funded. I don't think it does anything to solve the healthcare problems we face. So I am not a fan of the plan. But sure, I'd take the $5k - it would cover most of our premiums which we get little tax benefit from with private insurance).

[MonkeyMama]

Jim - health premiums and health expenses over 7.5% AGI ARE deductible on Schedule A actually.

It's not great though. But retirees do tend to have higher premiums and tend to get to itemize them.

HSAs are another alternative. We are HSA eligible but we will get to itemize more than the HSA max this year so we opt for itemizing for this year. We just play it year to year. (You can not use an HSA to pay premiums though. Which I guess is another reason we will fare better itemizing this year).

[jIM_Ohio]

Jim - health premiums and health expenses over 7.5% AGI ARE deductible on Schedule A actually.

It's not great though. But retirees do tend to have higher premiums and tend to get to itemize them.

HSAs are another alternative. We are HSA eligible but we will get to itemize more than the HSA max this year so we opt for itemizing for this year. We just play it year to year. (You can not use an HSA to pay premiums though. Which I guess is another reason we will fare better itemizing this year).

I knew expenses were deductable on schedule A
I did not think premiums were deductable.
I thought health care expenses were 10% of AGI (not 7.5%).

Tell me if this would work then (for a retired couple paying insurance premiums).

Spouse 1 withdraws 50k from IRA
Spouse 2 withdraws 10k from IRA (or enough to cover premiums and expenses for health care)
file taxes married filing seperately
both spouses itemize
make sure health care expenses are funded and paid thru an account for spouse 2.

When spouse 2 files, any expenses over 1k (10% of the 10k withdraw) is now deducted from taxes.

spouse 1 itemizes and takes all other deductions (property taxes, mortgage interest and similar)

Assuming the total itemized deductions are greater than 17900, would this make sense? If premiums can be deducted, they still need to meet the 10% rule for health care on schedule A, right?

If possible the following year spouse 1 withdraws 10k and spouse 2 50k (so the IRAs are drawn down ~equally prior to age 70.5) and also reverse who gets health care deduction.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Jim, you should be MAJORLY against McCain. Under his plan your sons will be excluded from many policies under preexisting conditions.

Yes when you are young and healthy you are paying for older people. BUT also if you are young, healthy, with a preexisting condition it won't happen. Like a friend who was 31 with breast cancer. She'll be screwed for life. My DH will be screwed for life with his preexisting condition.

Also don't forgot, right now if people have some recourse if the insurance company tries to say they don't cover certain things. They are usually in a group plan so you can complain to your employer and have their heft behind you.

Be in an individual policy and then try to fight an insurance company. People with HDHP think they are covered. Until they are told it doesn't fall under the coverage.

One biggie is maternity. Often you are insured but maternity needs a separate rider. Ouch. And you can't get it unless you are not pregnant for 1 year before.

Lots of problems with the problem. McCain's policy was recently review New England Journal of Medicine and so was Obama's.

To sum up McCain = not viable, many will become uninsurable.

Obama = TOO EXPENSIVE, nice but basically socialiazed.

So both plans were smacked down as not working.

[tripods68]

We have Blue Cross HMO for 3+family under DW's plan.

2009 Total healthcare Cost:
Employee pays $176.18 Bi-weekly deduction
Company pays $880.91 Bi-weekly

[jIM_Ohio]

So a few random health insurance ideas I have not heard suggested:

1) tie health insurance and life insurance together. When you die (before a given age) the health insurance company has to pay a benefit for you. The younger you are, the higher the payment. This is the health insurance companies incentive to give you care to keep you alive.

2) fund health insurance like we do car insurance or life insurance. The more you use it, the more you pay. You can modify your deductables (like car insurance) and have either simple policies (like term) or policies with cash value (like permanent insurance). Sell the health insurance the same way car and life are sold.

3) then require people get the insurance themselves. take the employer sponsored plan out of the equation. Health care is too closely tied to working- who you work for in particular- as to how much it costs. Cost should be based on usage.

4) Allow health insurance and health expenses to be fully deductable on schedule A (skip the 7.5% test and the $100 per occurance test) or give a health care credit.

5) Require simplified billing and pay by procedure, not admittance or individual items of a procedure. We just received a $750 bill from health care expenses incurred 15 months ago. In 2007 we were told the expenses were covered, the insurance company did a recent audit and changed their mind on whether certain aspects of a given procedure were covered. IMO once someone is on the table, all aspects of that visit are covered or all are not. It's not like I would be looking over doctor's shoulders saying "don't do that, but do this and this". If anyone here has ever paid for fertility treatments, you might know what I am talking about. AMAZED at the itemized bill- will cover #1, will cover #2, won't cover #3, won't cover #4, will cover #5...
like I knew there would be a transportation fee to get to lab on the next floor? PLEASE. Just bill the procedure.