Vengeful little suckers.
OK, so our area Blue Cross tried a few months ago to “merge” with Anthem, basically a bigger fish. Blue Cross policyholders voted NO on the merger, and it didn’t happen.
Now the premiums are (suddenly) shooting through the roof!
Oh, I’m sure this has NOTHING to do with the failed merger… yet isn’t it interesting that although their costs have only risen about 5%, their premiums are suddenly going up by over 20%???
Hmmmm.
The REAL reason that this pisses me off, of course, is because it means that I will NEVER get a decent raise around here!
A couple of years ago, one of our board members (bless his ass) commented on our crappy salaries, and a plan was put into motion to get salaries up to par, whereby one employee per budget year would get a “hefty” raise (as much as that’s possible in a non-profit).
So we started with my coworker, who made the crappiest salary of all. That first year, she got, the “heft”, while the rest of us got the usual 3% raise.
Fair enough and, I thought, well-deserved.
The following year, it was supposed to be my turn for the “hefty” raise.
Well.
Before that happened, our Blue Cross Insurance premiums (which are entirely employer-paid) went up by about 12%. Our board got a little pissy about the organization continuing to pay the entire premium, and wanted each employee to start picking up the slack out of our paychecks.
We finally arrived at a compromise: The “company” would continue to pay the entire premium, but in exchange, the Crappy Salary Improvement Plan was chucked out the window (in fact, the next year–the year that I was supposed to get my hefty raise–we only got 2% raises). Still, I had hope that one day we might bring it back to the table…
THIS year our Blue Cross premium is going up by FIFTY-TWO PERCENT.
I am never getting a raise again. 
I know one thing… I’m gonna start going to the damn doctor much more often!!! :mad: