How much and what is your healthcare insurance

[cooliemae]

Cooliemae do you have an HDHP option through work? Would it make sense for you to buy your own HDHP?

There are any HDHP plans in my area that are available through work, but I can't see it making sense to buy my own HDHP plan when my employer wouldn't help offset the cost.

[scfr]

PPO, covers 2 people.

I pay $470 per month pre-tax and employer pays $706 per month, so total monthly cost is $1,176.

Having just gone through open enrollment I priced out Affordable Care Act ($606 for Silver) and Costco (hard to know what would be comparable due to so many options but average cost was $1,572).

LAL, based on the numbers you gave it sounds like you have a great employer-provided plan where you pay only a small fraction of the cost, in which case a HDHP & HSA probably doesn't make sense for your family. Do you know what employer pays for your family's coverage?

In the past, when we were self-insuring, we had a HDHP & HSA for a couple years and then it did make the most sense for us.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Mickey the HDHP saves you $600/year in premiums and you don't spend that in visiting the dr annually? Sounds like a win. Are you able to switch every year during open enrollment? I would think it doesn't matter income but rather if you are a high or low user of medical costs right?

DS that's high for an HDHP of $700/month?

Thrif-T that is a great price.

Goodstewart how do you cover you and your wife but not the kids? Is it not economical? Cheaper to do them separate? Is it income based that they qualify? Instead of doing a family plan?

Moneybags, was the HDHP the cheapest cobra option?

Puck you said you paid $10/month. It's now $103 HDHP and $183 HMO. That $80/difference a month, is close to $1000/year so I can see how the HDHP can win out if you don't go to the dr.

SCFR I have no idea what the company pays. What we used to have was ridiculous good coverage and DH got a statement annually saying the company was paying around $2k/month for his coverage which was superior to even what we have now. It was a PPO so no referrals, I just called a dr when i wanted, had a $0 dedutible, $10 co-pays, and everything covered 100%. So seeing a specialist or doing any test or anything was covered. I walked in and paid $250 to have my DK1 and DK2 for hospital visit. Nothing else was OOP for a NICU baby 1 week. Well into the 6 figures. I can't imagine how a HDHP would ever come out ahead for us even with lower premiums. The premiums would have to be really cheap for us to want to pay OOP dr visits and anything else.

[disneysteve]

DS that's high for an HDHP of $700/month?

Welcome to insurance hell, aka New Jersey.

All insurance is outrageous here.

[puck36]

Puck you said you paid $10/month. It's now $103 HDHP and $183 HMO.

Is HMO the same as PPO because in SD its called PPO.

[sblatner]

I can beat everyone!

We live in Silicon Valley. $2250 a month for four people. Silver plan. We are self employed. It went up $550 a month this year. We checked a HDHP and it only saves us $300 a month and nothing is covered until we hit the deductible. Not worth it. Only saving grace is it makes our income a lot lower.

[moneybags]

Moneybags, was the HDHP the cheapest cobra option?

It was the only option. I did look at the market and costs were similar, so we stuck with what we had since we had money invested in the deductible.

[TexasHusker]

I can beat everyone!

We live in Silicon Valley. $2250 a month for four people. Silver plan. We are self employed. It went up $550 a month this year. We checked a HDHP and it only saves us $300 a month and nothing is covered until we hit the deductible. Not worth it. Only saving grace is it makes our income a lot lower.

We were in the same approximate boat two years ago. The employed white collar folks have no idea how expensive health insurance really is. Their employers are paying most of the freight.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

sblatner I believe we paid $650/month for HDHP with $6k deductible. Basically catastrophic insurance. We couldn't buy the silver plan.

TexasHusker, I think that yes white collar employees have no idea what it really costs for the company. At the same time with what premiums cost companies it could also be argued we could easily pay for a socialized system for everyone at a lower cost than what everyone is paying individually plus companies.

[terri77]

About $50 biweekly for a single person.

[FLA]

$650 a month for Cobra. Switching to a state plan Jan 1, then Feb 1 I become eligible for Medicare, I will probably choose an Advantage plan. Because of the high cost of certain meds, I land in the donut hole pretty quickly. I thought I would be better off than COBRA but that is looking unlikely.

[msomnipotent]

We finally got our benefit information for 2017. Our premiums have been raised $50 per month, so we will be paying $550 for 3 people, plus another $85 for vision and dental. Our copays are up and the deductible is now $250 instead of $200, and I have to get my highly perishable and not to be shaken drugs mailed to me (at a slightly higher cost), but this is still a lot better than being in the high risk state pool those many years ago.

I am expecting to have at least one surgery this year, so the HD plan was out of question for us. Even though it is only $150 per month, we would meet the deductibles with our labs and drug costs. Also, I don't want to be on the hook for 10% of whatever bills will be coming my way for the surgery. There is no OOP max with our HD plan.


There isn't any reason why white collar people (or even blue collar) wouldn't know how much their insurance costs. All they have to do is look at their pay stub and see how much they pay and how much their employer pays.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

We don't see on the paystub what the employer pays, just us.

[scfr]

We don't see on the paystub what the employer pays, just us.

I don't see it on my paystub either, but I can see it on the site where I go to make my benefit selections (in my case it's Oracle).

[msomnipotent]

Maybe it is just a local thing? I used to see it on my stubs and my husband has it on his. Even my sisters' have it on theirs and they work in completely different fields. I thought everyone had it.