It’s $230 or $460 for families to remain in Tricare even before retirement (assuming you’re a dependent)
It’s worth noting that Tricare-eligible individuals still have to stump for Medicare Part B coverage once they become Medicare-eligible.
Yup There is actually a cost, but mrAru has the checkbook today so I am not certain of the payment offhand. They will also disallow certain medications and procedures [I had to fight tooth and nail to get a DaVinci hysterectomy instead of a rip open my guts version. Being diabetic I have wound healing issues, and previous abdominal operation scarring and adhesions that had to be dodged around. The more rummaging around internally the worse adhesions tend to get.] I have to have my prescriptions written in very specific manners to actually get the meds I need in the dosages and brand I need. Hell, it took me 10 years to get them to actually put me in the diabetic maintenance program. Oh, and joy of joys. Diabetic, with a degenerative joint disease in my feet, if I want orthotics I have to buy them entirely out of pocket - they are not authorized by tricare.
Let me be clear: you all deserve Tricare coverage. No question in my mind. And I think you shouldn’t have to pay through the nose for it. But sometimes I’m not sure that some folks understand what a great deal Tricare is: you’re probably paying somewhere between 1/10th and 1/20th of the cost for insurance than the average American who didn’t serve in uniform, and your premiums have not gone up in many years.
I’m not saying Tricare is great insurance. But if you stacked it up with some of the HMOs… well, there are also some pretty shady HMOs out there, too.
Here’s my issue: the true cost of Tricare insurance is probably in the area of about $15,000 per family, if its costs are roughly in line with a private insurer. Let’s just say insurance costs go up 6% a year – in five years, that health insurance coverage will cost the government about $20,000 or more. Is it fair to still be paying $230/$460 for that coverage? Especially knowing that higher and higher health insurance costs mean that the Pentagon will have to divert money from operations, maintenance, equipment, or other costs needed to support the people who are now serving in uniform?
Is there anything especially wrong with saying, rather than paying $230/$460 a year, a retiree will pay 5% of the cost of Tricare insurance, and the government will pay 95%. If health care costs go up, you still pay 5%, and that’s the deal you’ll have for the rest of your life. Compare that to virtually anything available at pretty much any job anywhere, and that’s still a really, really good deal.
ETA: aruvqan: I’m very sorry to hear about your health problems, and I think Tricare ought to be doing a better job for caring for you.
My mistake. I shouldn’t have characterized the medical care as “free.” Most of my career (and earlier, as an Army dependent) actually pre-dated TRICARE. They had CHAMPUS for family health care, but my family and I actually got all of our medical care at the military health care clinics, which had no fees whatsoever, IIRC.
However, as noted by Ravenman, the current military medical system (TRICARE), while evidently not free, appears to be significantly cheaper than anything available to those not in the military. I was shocked at how much I had to pay for medical care for myself and my family after getting out, and that was at jobs that had medical plans, which were also subsidized by my companies, but not nearly to the same extent as TRICARE apparently is.
And every medical plan I’ve ever had has had drug exclusions.
The $460 annual TRICARE Prime family enrollment fee (for military retirees) is about a tenth of what it currently costs me for my family’s medical plan. Also, most employers do not provide any medical plan whatsoever for retirees–you have to wait until you are eligible for Medicare.
You would be wrong.
THanks …
However, keep in mind one of the charming bullshit statements of the military is that our medical care is part of the income, so theoretically Rob was making $5000 more per year than actual monetary income. At the same time, I was working and getting similar crappy medical insurance to CHAMPUS [at first] then Tricare [when they changed over] (I did mention that Rob was in for 20 years …)
Personally, we would have gone with just my outside medical insurance and taken the $5000 …
And 20 years of substandard pay, substandard housing, being shuffled around the country and the insane treatment by the military, reduced cost medical care is barely worth it. Oh, and it still goes away at 65 and turns to the generic medicare that everybody else qualifies for. So it isn’t permanent for life.
Well, it would have been nice if they hadn’t shipped out the OB/GYN staff and not bothered to replace them. Turning the base hospital with trauma center, and everything into barely a doc in a box walk in clinic sucks ass. It used to be a functioning hospital, where you could get an operation and a post op stay of however long it took, now they outsource pretty much anything. I have had to get my routine gyn care/mamograms and most routine checkups elsewhere. We stopped bothering to pay for prime as nothing I needed was available there, it was all outsourced and I didn’t see why if it was outsourced I had to pay a copay. If I CHOSE to go outside the hospital, then I could see a copay, but not even having the doctor available forcing me to outsource, and then copay? Meh. Close the damned facility totally and stop bullshitting around. [Discussing the submarine base in New London CT, where Robby and my husband both were stationed]
You misread me. I wasn’t talking about Americans abroad. I was talking about them at home.
It is not my government, I am not Egyptian. But I do agree they should stop the aid.
Most is spent now on enhancing internal security and keeping Mubarak in power and crushing the likes of El Baradei or Ayman Nour. It keeps one party in power. Importantly this in turn recruits people to the Muslim Brotherhood. Take a walk round Cairo and talk to the people.
The rest is on condition it buys US products which ensure the return of the money back to the US two fold.
Ordinary Egyptians do not benefit and they see this.
They see the US as a supporter of a dictator for 3 decades.
Ask the man in the street.
I’d be perfectly fine with that. Health care and education are two of the best benefits available; anything else isn’t that big a deal. Many benefits exist for historical reasons, anyway; the VA mortgage program was started as a nice “thank you” to the veterans coming home from WWII and Korea, as was the exchange system. The commissary system was established to prevent black marketeering in WWII; I’m pretty sure it’s outlived its usefulness.
Besides, the people to whom we owe money would like it in money, not in gift certificates to the PX. They’re just funny that way.
Hey don’t forget about chickens.