another insurance question

Not to hijack the post below, but how many of you have health insurance? I used to always carry it, but the last 3 years, it has gotten to
the point that I don't have it. We fall into the wrong income bracket for any handouts. I would be plumb content with a $5000 deductible, and
just for major hospitalization. I can pay my own meds, and doctor visits. The wife BETTER not propagate!!
Last year, she worked strictly for insurance. By the time we bought another vehicle for her to drive, 40 miles each way, put gas in it, and
she fixed things to take for lunch, all she did was provide insurance. To me it wasn't worth it. She is more valuable to me being home to
help me.
I didn't start this thread to be political, just frustrated that we can't find anything that we can afford, that will protect us.

Sorry for the news, only thing I can think of is you must NOT be the average family because we were promised numerous times they would save something like $2,700 per year. I'm lucky to be a retired Navy Federal DOD retiree as we were able to keep our Federal Blue Cross and that coupled with Medicare A & B is decent in cost HOWEVER, were NOT seeing that $2700 savings so we must not be that average family either lol I WONDER WHO THAT AVERAGE FAMILY IS???? Anybody out there seen that savings???? If so please let other know your plan

John T

So if you get sick the taxpayers are just going to take care of you? Or are you just going to crawl off in a corner and die? Medical costs can reach a million real quick, are you prepared for that?

Just got my statement from the insurance company. My 5 days in the hospital cost them nearly $16,000. Haven't seen the Dr. bills yet. Ambulance billed for the full amount instead of the insurance rate so they denied that claim. They'll settle it between them; we just make the co-pays.

Mine really hasn't changed any. I have Medicare, with a Blue Cross Medicare supplement that costs $131 per month, plus the VA as a safety net under it all. As a County Commissioner, I'm eligible for the county's insurance plan but it's almost an exact trade-off from what I have now so why rock the boat?

And contrary to horror stories from across the country, the care I've received from the Nebraska/Western Iowa VA centers is pretty much equal to the civilian care I get. I get all of my prescription meds from the VA. A couple of service connected ones are no charge and non service connected are $8 copay for a two month supply, with no annual deductible.

My wife has her own Medicare supplement, a continuation of the plan she had as an employee of the University of Nebraska.

Marilyn and I have always carried health insurance. I don't know how many tens of thousands we have paid out in premiums in 42 years but overall we have gained more than we have lost. Some folks have never been a hospital or Doctor patient. We are not among those fortunate few.

Now, I don't want this to be political and I will try to word this in a non political way. I have a friend whom I've known for 45 years who has never carried health insurance. He is very talented and has mostly earned his money independently without a regular job and has made a modest living. He has been blessed with good health through the years but now that he is over 60 he needs to have a few health related parts fixed up.

He has always been a very strong conservative politically and can rattle off a whole list of evils the liberals carry out but when the health care bill came to be he was first in line to apply for free or taxpayer subsidized health insurance so he could get his worn and torn body renewed and paid for by subsidized insurance. Now what political party pushed the health care bill? Oh, I doubt if he has paid much income tax through the years. I won't go any farther.

Maybe they meant you will need to save $2700 to help pay for your insurance....

I wonder why a person cant select coverage like you do for your car insurance? Im guessing because if you did the insurance company wouldn't make as much money. It isn't right to make it a law and not regulate the other end of it. Im not for government regulation but in certain cases things need to be done. A persons life is at the mercy of the insurance company. They can charge you whatever they want because they know you have to have it. How can a person give up daily living requirements like food and shelter just to have insurance?....and then die of hunger in the meantime. Yes it is an extreme example but it is true in that respect.

What really gripes me is that if anything happens to a non-insured person, they know that they can go to a community hospital and get free car AT MY EXPENCE! That is exactly what is driving up cost of health insurance. There was talk early on during the ACA legislation debates that if someone showed up at an ER requiring treatment that they would be REQUIRED to sign up for ACA or other health insurance.. Did that go through?

OOPS... Not free car.. rather free CARE!!

(quoted from post at 16:15:26 11/30/15) I wonder why a person cant select coverage like you do for your car insurance? Im guessing because if you did the insurance company wouldn't make as much money. It isn't right to make it a law and not regulate the other end of it. Im not for government regulation but in certain cases things need to be done. A persons life is at the mercy of the insurance company. They can charge you whatever they want because they know you have to have it. How can a person give up daily living requirements like food and shelter just to have insurance?....and then die of hunger in the meantime. Yes it is an extreme example but it is true in that respect.

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It isn't just the insurance companies. It's the high cost of health care. One industry feeds the other, and the people, who it is supposed to serve, are caught in the middle.

Free car sounds better lol...... Stop in and get a free car!

In my job they have told me I have to get it. These past 29 years I have paid in to it and notice each year it goes up in price. These past threee years my price has jumped three times the almount of what I pay. It is amazing to me the coast of the insurance is. If I did not work I just do not understand how I could aford this and live at the same time.

thanks to OB-BS care it went up 780.00 last year and is going to go up at least that much more this year.

My car, business, truck, tractor, home, income and health insurance exceeds what my first contract was in 1972. Property taxes are more than all insurances combined. BTW, I've been retired 12 years now.

One of the biggest causes of the high cost of medical care is the insurance companies themselves. Try to follow this one....

When I was a young lad, we had a country doctor that made house calls. If I or one of my siblings was sick, Mom would call the doctor. Doctor would come to the house and treat the sick one(s). Mom would write him a check when he was ready to leave. Prices were fair and affordable. Hospitals were for REAL emergencies. Sirens actually meant something - unlike today.

Enter the insurance companies. When widespread availability of health care insurance came to be, it was much sought after. Folks that never needed a doctor in their lives were suddenly packing doctor's offices and hospital emergency rooms. Insurance companies were giving blank checks (so to speak) to health care providers. They could charge whatever they wanted and were seldom if ever questioned. Prices that were formerly unheard of became standard practice to the point that the individual could not afford to be without insurance.

Typically, politicians approach the problem from the wrong end. As a result, they end up "fixing" the part that was not "broken" in the first place - and NOT fixing the part that NEEDED fixing.

Overall, the health car industry makes up about one SIXTH of our GNP. Turning it over to government will only make it more inefficient and ineffective. Regulation in some areas would make sense. Especially the pharmaceuticals. After all, is there anything that the government does well or efficiently???

(quoted from post at 18:45:09 11/30/15) One of the biggest causes of the high cost of medical care is the insurance companies themselves. Try to follow this one....

When I was a young lad, we had a country doctor that made house calls. If I or one of my siblings was sick, Mom would call the doctor. Doctor would come to the house and treat the sick one(s). Mom would write him a check when he was ready to leave. Prices were fair and affordable. Hospitals were for REAL emergencies. Sirens actually meant something - unlike today.

Enter the insurance companies. When widespread availability of health care insurance came to be, it was much sought after. Folks that never needed a doctor in their lives were suddenly packing doctor's offices and hospital emergency rooms. Insurance companies were giving blank checks (so to speak) to health care providers. They could charge whatever they wanted and were seldom if ever questioned. Prices that were formerly unheard of became standard practice to the point that the individual could not afford to be without insurance.

Typically, politicians approach the problem from the wrong end. As a result, they end up "fixing" the part that was not "broken" in the first place - and NOT fixing the part that NEEDED fixing.

Overall, the health car industry makes up about one SIXTH of our GNP. Turning it over to government will only make it more inefficient and ineffective. Regulation in some areas would make sense. Especially the pharmaceuticals. After all, is there anything that the government does well or efficiently???

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Administration takes up a lot of the health care money. In 1977 I lost my right leg. While in the hospital there was no shortage of nurses, nurses aids, candy stripers, and volunteers. All there to take care of the patients who were there. About five years later I had to go back in for some reconstruction surgery on my stump. I had noticed that they were adding a large wing onto the hospital. I asked one of the nurses if they were expanding for more patient rooms. She told me it was for office space for administration. Several years later I needed shoulder surgery and had to stay at the same hospital, on the same floor as I was on before. There was only one nurse on the whole floor, and all the rooms were full. The people who pay for the big facility had all their services cut in order to pay for added administration.

Our health insurance policy, that was very reasonable in price, did not met the Affordable Care guidelines. So it was dropped and replaced with a policy that covers things we will never need, like pregnancy , and costs $9800 a year more. It is my biggest expense. $1725 per month.

The whole health care system is broken and it all started during WWII. The wages where frozen so companies started offering better benefits to attract workers. Work provided health care came about. The trouble with health insurance is that it makes the majority of your health care cost be paid by a third party, i.e. the insurance company. That removes a self governing part of health care. Since it no longer costs you anything directly to see a doctor, people started going for just about anything.

I compare it to a having a free gas card. If you did not paid directly for your gas would you care what kind of mileage your vehicle got??? Would you regulate your driving habits??? Combining trips or driving in a conservative manner??? I think that over a pretty short time you would not pay any attention to where, how, or what you drove. Your gas usage would go up and up. That is what happened to health care. The demand shot up without much in the way of self governing the real need for the service. external_link care just makes this worse as it added more people that do not pay for their health care.

Also tort reform is need as well. I know that Doctors make honest mistakes but it now costs MILLIONs for those few real negligent actions. I have a very good friend that is a family practitioner. He has had to greatly restrict what services he does in his family practice because of malpractice insurance cost. He had to quit delivering babies ten years ago or so because his insurance was going UP $200K if he kept delivering babies. That is not the total cost that was just the increase. He never has had a claim in the 30 years he has been a doctor.

Then why do we need totally NEW buildings for hospitals????? They are keeping people less and have more rooms. I have gotten to spend a lot of time in them these last years. The majority of them have a lot of empty rooms but they are building like no tomorrow.

So there are lots of problems with the current system and the Affordable Care act addressed none of the real issues. It just got the government involved in your daily health care. This put another layer between you and your Doctor. That is exactly the WRONG thing that is needed. Paying directly for your own health care really helped regulate the cost and demand. No we have your insurance company, the government, and usually a big corporate health care provider on the doctor end. So there is very little that is directly taken care of anymore.

Just my read on all of this.

P.S. I guess I should do like a lot of farmers have done around me. Transfer all the assets to my kids so that on paper I would be worth little to nothing an have the tax payers pickup my healthcare and nursing home cost. One of these fellows had seven farms 8 years ago. He put them in his kids names. He is on Medicaid in the nursing homes now. His one son brags about how smart his Dad was to avoid paying all that money for nursing home care. He is truly worth millions but the taxpayers, that are way poorer, are paying his way.

I have paid well over 500000 in medical bills so far in my life time. I just turned 52. At this point I expect I will just go over the hill and die like any good old dog would do.

(quoted from post at 13:10:06 11/30/15) I have paid well over 500000 in medical bills so far in my life time. I just turned 52. At this point I expect I will just go over the hill and die like any good old dog would do.

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n Canada healthcare is free for the ones that need it..
I can't remember having ever paid a buck for doctor or hospital.
Only meds are being charged but with blue cross taking up the biggest tab it is not to bad,..for the wife and me combined maybe $125/month.
I have high BP and the wife is Diabetic and has high BP and high cholesterol

The high costs are just fraud between insurance and providers. 20 years ago took wire to a place for therapy after knee surgery. While there I noticed they had an eye doctor and insurance didn't cover eye exam. I decided now is a good time to get eyes checked and new prescription. I got it done and went to pay and it was $200.00. I know I should have ask before but I didn't. I said that is way too high so they called the DR. but and he said he was a DR. not optometrist. I said I know but some one, not you did all the work on my eye test and after she was done I saw you for 2 minutes. He was mad and said, what difference does it make, insurance will pay for it. I said my insurance doesn't cover eye exam. By that time several people at the clinic was listing. At that time one of then said Oh, I thought you had insurance, for private pay your bill will be only $100.00. Now that made me mad and I told the all that is why insurance is so high, you are all crocked. Now wife is pulling on my arm saying give them their $100.00 and lets go. I did and I still mad about that.

Between the health care costs, EPA regulations, so called supreme court justices making the rules up as they go, it just keeps getting better and better. I was just reading about how EPA is banning a good percentage of wood heat (new purchases). Guess I had better take good care of my outdoor wood furnace, as it appears it is now against the law to put a new one in if this one were to fail. Sorry to get off topic, but in reality is all part of the same economic game be it external_linkcare, EPA or other agency taking care of us cradle to the grave that is killing our economy. That reminds me, I should run out and toss another log on the fire .

I have had health insurance for the last 4 years, since I switched jobs. No vision and just a little dental, but it is better than what I had before. 9 years previous to switching jobs, I had no health, no vision, no dental. The company I worked for offered it, but it would have taken almost half of my paycheck, didn't cover much, and had a 10,000 dollar deductible that had to be met before anything was covered. I had broken my back in a car accident, but my auto policy took care of the complications with that ordeal.

Ross

JD Seller----I had to put my Dad in the nursing home for the last 1 1/2 years of his life. There were people there that I had known for a lot of years in my life who were getting their care paid for by the government (us taxpayers). My Dad had worked hard and smart, did without, and saved his money. I paid his bill every month with his money and it was like a thorn in my flesh while I wrote those checks. Just never could wrap my thoughts around the idea how it was right for some to pay their bill while the majority there were being kept there with government funds.

When my Dad died I was at the nursing home getting his belongings out of his room. As I carried them down the hallway to my pickup I turned and looked down the hallway to his room this thought went through my mind----He paid his OWN way. Those that are being supported by the government will never be able to say that. Those thoughts took away the bitterness toward those who will NEVER be able to say that they paid their way.

It may be that some of them paid their own way at first. At 6 grand a month, it doesn't take long to burn through a large pile of money. At that point Medicaid kicks in (can't very well boot em to the curb.)

I'm on your side and agree that we have too many depending on the government for too much but I see how folks in nursing homes can end up on the government dole. Kudos to your dad for having enough savings to take care of himself. Something to be proud of.