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Thread: Health Insurance

  1. #1
    Veteran Member DancingDaisy's Avatar
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    Default Health Insurance

    I was not sure where to post this. Back when I was working with another company, they offered health insurance through United Healthcare. When I did have an accident and need to go to the emergency room, the health insurance hardly covered anything. I was paying almost $400 a month for this insurance to cover my son, my ex husband, and I. I lost work due to the accident and ended up dancing to pay bills when I recovered. But thats another story.

    Now Im with another company and I have the benefits information and they go through United Healthcare also. Insurance rates have risen and now to cover the same amount of people it will be almost $500 a month.(I will still have my ex husband on there even though we are seperated because he has health issues and cant get insurance otherwise)

    I was wondering if it may be better to get insurance on my own. I still dance, but only on weekends. Does anyone have independent health insurance? I looked it up and there are a ton of companies but Im not sure which ones a reputable companies that would actually pay for bills. Any recommendations? After what Iv been through I dont really trust any insurance companies at all.

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    God/dess firemaiden04's Avatar
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    Default Re: Health Insurance

    Insurance is rarely cheaper when you get it independent of an employer. For me, a 23-year-old single female in NY, the cheapest insurance I can get is $806 a month. And that's just for me, and it's just basic, with rather high copays and no dental, vision, mental, or prescription coverage.

    I'm somewhat surprised your United Health Care is so expensive...that's what my Mom and my fiancee both get through their jobs, and they don't pay anywhere near as much as you've been paying for it. Sometimes it just depends on the company you work for and what they're willing to get for their employees.

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    Banned Melonie's Avatar
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    Default Re: Health Insurance

    For the moment at least, there are massively big state to state variations in health insurance costs. In New York, for example, health insurance costs are comparatively high because the state mandates that all health insurers cover costs of all sorts of peripheral areas ... from hearing aids to alcohol / drug rehab to psychiatric treatment ... which do not fall into the category of 'critical medical treatment', but which nonetheless involve significant costs. And NY law simply does not allow insurance companies to write 'catastrophic / critical care only' insurance policies which are comparatively affordable, but which do not cover all of the peripheral stuff and limit their coverage areas to emergency treatment, diagnostics, surgery etc.

    Additionally, New York's high percentage of medicaid patients, and accompanying low medicare reimbursement rates to doctors and hospltals, forces New York health care providers to mark up prices for medical services provided to privately insured patients ... which further increases NY private health insurance premium costs.

    In an effort to remain competitive with businesses in other US states ( not to mention foreign countries ) that do not mandate similarly expensive scopes of health insurance coverage ( which has just been exacerbated by new laws mandating that employers cover dependents to age 30 in some situations plus extend coverage to dependents with pre-existing and expensive medical conditions), many NY businesses have been 'forced' to pass on an ever increasing share of private health insurance premiums to employees versus the NY employers having to 'eat' all of the increasing health insurance premium costs. This obviously takes the form of higher monthly insurance premium cost, plus higher deductibles and co-pays.

    Firemaiden is correct that, in general, attempting to purchase health insurance coverage outside of an employer is usually more expensive. However, in a flip side situation, NY at least recognizes that it's insurance mandates have caused individual health insurance costs to become so expensive that many simply cannot afford the premiums. As such, NY now offers gov't subsidized health insurance coverage where the cost of premiums is scaled to 'officially reported' income levels. The gov't subsidized health insurance coverage also controls costs by denying rehab / psychiatric / pre-existing condition coverage under it's subsidized health insurance that it mandates for NY employer coverage ! See and

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