So I just got a new job… Which is good and exciting!
But I have no benefits… Which is okay!
Except that I have to buy personal health insurance… Which sucks the condom off an anally used smegma smothered penis!
Why is it so stupidly expensive?
You’re not looking in the right place. Where do you live?
It is expensive cause this is America -
Try “Golden Rule” - I had to look into medical insurance a while back (for some people who couldn’t get coverage at work) and they were reasonable for a company with a good history.
Oh yeah, you might want to hold off on the cutting til the policy goes into effect.
Yea, you could get a nasty infection.
Heheheh I live in Chicago…
Well, this happens to be what I do. Email me and I’ll hook you up with a Chi-town area rep. I wouldn’t go with Golden Rule unless you want an umbrella deductable and a neverending series of rate increases, but that’s just me.
Sounds like the way that “Golden Rule” outfit treated Richard Ames in Heinlein’s The Cat Who Walks Through Walls.
Hey, can I email you too? We spend almost $400 a month (giant deductable, no frills) and the thing only kicks in if one of us gets hit by a truck!
Sure, glad to help. Mods, is this OK? I didn’t place the OP and I won’t get any personal gain from this ( unless someone in my state is interested ), but it is a huge need and frankly there is no organization anywhere like mine that can provide these benefits ( and it’s non-profit to boot ) at good rates. I just don’t want to fall afoul of the “No advertising for personal businesses” rule.
I don’t believe that you can get individual health insurance at a “reasonable” price. The reason is that fundamental principle of insurance - selection. Meaning that since the individual is making a conscious choice to buy insurance and is picking up the entire cost of the coverage, the average enrollee is disproportionately likely to be someone who has reason to believe they might need health coverage. Those who see themselves as pretty healthy are more likely to forego coverage. By contrast, in a group coverage situation, with the company picking up much of the tab, even people who think they are healthy are more likely to opt for the coverage.
In sum, the average person who opts for individual coverage tends to be sicker than the average person who opts for employee sponsored health coverage, and this makes the rates higher. Add to this a slightly higher administrative cost as well, and the rates are just going to be a lot higher. There is no way around it.
Individual insurance does suck. To get good coverage, it’s incredibly expensive. The best I was able to do was fairly crappy coverage. Luckily Mr. Athena and I are more or less healthy.
Do talk to Weirddave - he gave me GREAT advice, even though I ended up going with Golden Rule, primarily because it turned out that Dave’s coverage in my particular state was really sky high. IIRC, the quote that Dave gave me, had I lived in his state, was a very low price for really good coverage. Unfortunately, the quote the local rep for the same insurance gave me was about 3 times as much. Regardless, Dave talked me through many of the ins and outs of health insurance coverage, and his input was invaluable.
What I ended up with was coverage from Golden Rule. I pay them somewhere near $2700/year for coverage for me and Mr. Athena, and they say they’ll cover all our medical expenses above the first $1500/year/person. I’ve yet to have a chance to test that. I also worry that the premiums will start to increase in cost. Golden Rule guarantees the quote for the first year, and it’s been longer than that and no price increase. Let’s hope it stays that way.
I work for a large health insurance company (in the Marketing department) and the standard party line answer to your question is, “Health insurance is expensive because health care is expensive.”
Which I agree with to a point, but come on…it’s not like insurance companies aren’t making any money! I’d jump at the chance to move to socialized health care.
Good Lord. I’d think that unless I needed constant medical care, it wouldn’t be worth paying for individual insurance if it’s THAT bad. I’d rather not pay (say) $400 a month on the off chance that I might get sick – if I DO get sick I’ll figure out a way to pay for a doctor visit. Egad.
Sure. Have at it Dave.
It has been my experience in working for two insurance companies which sell both group and individual plans that the people who buy individual insurance are people who don’t qualify for group coverage. They are self-employed, or they work for a company that doesn’t offer group insurance, or they are getting a stop-gap policy as they transition between one group plan or another, or a parent’s plan and their employer’s plan, or an employer’s plan to Medicare. They are not necessarily sicker than those who have access to group coverage. The reason that individual rates tend to be higher than group rates is because of risk. If an insurer can spread its risk over a group of 100 or 500 people it can offer lower rates than it can to a single person with no one else to help absorb that risk. The obvious solution is to allow people unable to access group coverage to join together in their own group based on region or some other factor but that doesn’t seem like it’s under discussion in the industry.
Hey OP:
Just say no to State Farm’s Fortis. It sucks.
I have company benefits, but I’m paying $60 a month for “catastrophic” coverage with a $1,000 deductible and it only kicks in if something majorly horrible happens. To get regular benefits so I could go to the doctor would be $80 a week. And what’s more, the damn coverage is from Blue Cross/Blue Shield, which is NO LONGER ACCEPTED BY ANY LOCAL DOCTORS - they all got together and decided not to take it anymore because they didn’t like the payments they were receiving. So even if I do get hit by a truck and find a thousand dollars to pay my deductible off with, they’ll have to drive my broken body forty-five minutes to the next town over to find a doctor who’ll take my fucking insurance.
I’m starting to think it’s not even worth it.
I’m pretty sure all insurance companies have never ending rate increases, not advocating Golden Rule, that’s just my experience with all insurance companies.
You are missing the point here. Of course those are the reasons for those guys not getting group insurance. But within the world of those guys and similar such guys, there are some people who will get insurance, and some who will not. Those who will are more likely to be those who think they might need it. This is simple common sense, and also basic underwriting principles.
I don’t know who told you what “working for two insurance companies”, but as a health care actuary, I can assure you that this is a huge factor. (Even company sponsored groups are subject to a “selection spiral” if they raise contributions too high. What happens is that the healthier employees are the first to decide that it is not worth it, so they begin to move out, raising rates even further on the rest, causing the almost-healthiest to drop coverage causing rates to go up even more etc. etc.)
There is no reason for the single person to have to absorb the risk. The insurance company does not need - or expect - to make money on every single contract. That’s the whole point of insurance. From a pure risk perspective, there is no difference between insuring 1,000 individuals or insuring one group with 1,000 members.
This is not a viable solution due to selection problems, as above. What you can do (& already exists) is group coverage for groups other than companies, provided that the group exists for some purpose other than insurance and that a relatively high percentage of group members opt for the coverage. This takes care of the selection issue, but such groups are hard to come by.