This is just too much. Insurance rates based on life style.

The BBQ Pit
61

By Lifestyle Incentive, I mean the prevailing trend by employers to fund the HRA/HSA to a greater extent, based upon completion of a smoking-cessation course, or maintenence of a certain BMI.

I will mention that I work primarily with jumbo-sized companies who exist on ASO contracts. I have worked in the past for a company the integrated various (and numerous) lifestyle tweaks, such as gym memberships, added interest rates to the HRA baalnce, etc.

So, this may be slightly off-topic, since these aren’t penalties for the unhealthy, but benefits for the “healthy”.

One more thing. I agree totally with WeirdDave on the 95% non-saving-the-difference number. I would probably bump it up into the 98% range. A Whole Life (or Universal) is usually good, as it makes them save.

62

Well, no. Once again, if you are priced out of insuring a car, you walk. You are removed from the group of people having liability in a traffic accident. Either that, or you pay beforehand for the future damage you’ll cause. Either way, raising the rates on drivers who exhibit unsafe behavior lowers the amount that everyone else has to pay.

If you remove unhealthy people from the health insurance risk pool, they don’t see doctors. They go to the Emergency Room. The hospital avoids bankruptcy by charging the healthy population more for every service they perform for them. So removing a population at risk means increasing the total liability for everyone in the pool. The math works in the opposite way, you see.