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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Carragher who wrote (163873)	4/18/2006 10:32:27 AM
From: aladin	Respond to of 793801

John, Individuals and families that invest the money they would otherwise spend on medical insurance can build a nest egg worth over $100,000 in just 5 years. and $250,000 in 10 years. i would like to see the assumptions on those stats. I have a very high end employer sponsored plan that costs me about $5,000 per year. Thats a NPV of $76,000 at 10 years (8% compounded). However, I believe the author was discussing self-employed individuals. A policy similar to mine for a family might cost $1,400 per month - netting about $250,000 after 10 years. However - running naked assumes you are healthy for at least 10 years to build a nest egg capable of surviving a catastrophic illness. In my case I was paying in to the system for about 15 years when my wife became ill. Assume I had invested 1,200 per month at 8% for 15 years (and that she had not had a couple of difficult deliveries and hadn't used any medical help) - we would have had 415k when she was diagnosed with a brain tumor. Unfortunately for us (financially) my wife survived these past 11 years and at the peak of medical intervention we were using the system at about $25k per week. In 2005 my out of pocket ws 17k - the plan expenses were over 300k. This was not our worst year. The libertarian in me says - live and let live (or die as the case may be), but the practical says we need universal health insurance (not socialized medicine). We do not let hospitals let people without means die, so us ants pay for all the profligate grasshoppers out there. To combat this - why not have a backup system for those who do not have employer plans? Whats wrong with a 'basic' plan thats instituted as a wage tax just like we do for medicare? The right plan would only tax those who do not have other coverage. It would also allow people to 'opt out' if they can prove they can handle the risk financially, but my point is there are very few who can do it. The trouble with folks who think they can do this is - they have no bargaining power. The EOB in my hand for a chemo my wife received last year is $20,863.95 - the plan rate was $17,734.36 and paid at 100%. As an individual I am being sent that full 20k price and missing a pretty big discount. Doesn't look like much - but $3,000 a week on chemo can add up. John