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Wednesday, April 29. 2020

Portable medical insurance

Ever since I graduated from grad school I have kept a major medical plan. Yes, it it portable.


Over my lifetime, medical costs have expanded enormously, mainly because of what medical science in the the US is able to do. Miraculous things. All worth doing? I do not know, but the USA has the best medical options in the world, however expensive. Among many other problems with Obamacare (a stalking horse for government medical care) was the absence of a regular cheap major medical plan like the one I still have.


Shop around. These policies still exist. 


Speaking personally, I am not afraid of dying if I am in bad shape, but I think life is a kick and I'd be glad to stick with it for a while, working, making a living, and having an interesting life. 


Two links:


 EMPLOYER PROVIDED HEALTH INSURANCE DELENDA EST


Coronavirus: One thing that makes job loss in US so painful


Making political hay out of an epidemic is shameful, but there is a point. 


Also this:  Hillary Clinton on Coronavirus and Universal Health Care: 'This Would Be a Terrible Crisis to Waste'


WTF? 

Posted by The Barrister in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 13:25 | Comments (13) | Trackbacks (0)

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My brother and sister in law use a medical concierge service. They are paying NO insurance for basic care. The concierge also has several tiers of services. They pay a few hundred dollars a month for the full spate of services. On top of their monthly membership fee, they pay a scant 10 bucks for visits, and no more than 50 for labs, x-rays, mri scans, etc. They have done quite well doing this, and more and more doctors are chucking insurance.
#1 Jewel (Link) on 2020-04-29 14:06 (Reply)
It used to be that conservatives were not believed when they pointed out that liberals seemed to be relishing crises and using them to smuggle in whatever was next on their list, and that there were actual quotes of people saying such things behind closed doors. It was still dismissed in the days of James Carville and Bill Clinton as fever-dreams of Republicans.

Now they just say it out loud, and their followers don't bat an eyelash.
#2 Assistant Village Idiot on 2020-04-29 14:37 (Reply)
You are right. They're burning down the house so they can rule over the ashes. With regard to healthcare, just from Feb to March almost 200,000 healthcare workers were either fired or furloughed. Many hospitals, offices and clinics could be forced into bankruptcy.

All of the health, cancer screenings that are not being done now will boomerang within the coming year and bring much pain and suffering.
#2.1 Scissor (Link) on 2020-04-29 15:46 (Reply)
".....a regular cheap major medical plan like the one I still have."

Such as? Point me in the direction?
#3 Jay Dee (Link) on 2020-04-29 14:39 (Reply)
Employer supplied health insurance is the reason we have this issue about pre-existing conditions. My parents bought a $10,000 life insurance policy when I was born and it has grown into a $250,000 policy since then. If health insurance were sold more like the way my parents bought life insurance for me, we wouldn't have this problem with pre-existing conditions.

I disagree with you that medical costs have expanded because of the advance of medical science. I think a lot of it is because of cost of malpractice insurance. Obamacare's requirement for digital records (well intentioned as it might be but was overly bureaucratic) also raised costs enough that a lot of doctors chose to let a big hospital take over their practice and they became employees. To be sure, technology is part of it but I don't think it's the biggest cost.
#4 mudbug on 2020-04-29 15:01 (Reply)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RDMdc5r5z8&feature=emb_logo
Guess which category most health care money is?
#5 Andrew Stanton on 2020-04-29 17:40 (Reply)
As memory holds, health insurance at the student level, was relatively inexpensive.

There was no such thing as health insurance when I was growing up in the 50s. There were some company funded benefit programs available with some prosperous companies but, for the most part, going to the Doc was pretty much a cash and carry arrangement.

When insurance came into play so did insurance commissions and that, of course, brought in a pool of money for lawyers, which then provided a larger pool of funds available for lobbying and that leads to more regulation and pretty soon the fundamental reason for having a shared risk pool was foundered with burdens unrelated to health care.
#6 Tallywhagger on 2020-04-29 19:06 (Reply)
Portable as long as you don't try to bring it to California.
#7 ama on 2020-04-29 19:58 (Reply)
No matter what kind of "health insurance" which you may be talking about, there's a dead rhinoceros in the middle of the living room: Old people. We can't keep millions of elderly on life-support, that would be cruel, and it would create a terrible burden for all of their children.

We will have to round them up, and euthanize them. There's no other choice. Unless you want millions of broke, crazy old people wandering the streets. That can't be allowed. At issue here are the questions of 1. Authority, and 2. Responsibility. Is anyone authorized to do this? Yes, the men who are at the top of our social and political and military hierarchy. Those men are our leaders. Some people may say that we live in a "Democracy" so we don't have any leaders. Only 'Servants". But that's not true. Some men rise to positions of authority, and they make the decisions; they assume responsibility for the future of our country. That's real life. So if people can stop daydreaming, and recognize the urgency of the situation, then the job can be done more easily. But thousands of people, who believe that they are acting heroically, will try to interfere. They will think that they are "saving" old people, but in reality they are just stopping old people from ending their lives in a dignified manner. An injection is much preferable to slowly withering away. Or sleeping on the sidewalk.

Insurance has nothing to do with it. In a few years, there won't be any insurance. Just cash clinics.
#8 Ron Liebermann on 2020-04-29 20:50 (Reply)
The groundbreaking work was done 80 years ago. It was called the T4 Program.
#8.1 Andrew Stanton on 2020-04-30 09:21 (Reply)
There are many reasons why private medical insurance isn't affordable for most people these days. Some of them are mentioned in the above comments. But making it affordbale and available would be much better than employer-subsidized. I just don't see the political will to do it. Most people assume it's always been this way and always will.

Before ACA I was between jobs for a while. Actually, I took advantage of being laid off and took a different career plan late in life. I was in school and making a little money as a trim carpenter. We could afford a medical plan to cover major events for about $500 a month. I already entered a new career before ACA was in effect, but something similar can't be found for less than $1500 today. Probably much more. As far as I understand, high-deductable, major event insurance isn't even allowed under the ACA.
#9 Jack Walter on 2020-04-30 07:50 (Reply)
We had a decent high-deductible, major-event self-employed market policy before the ACA, guaranteed re-issue, robust coverage, carefully maintained for years. I screwed up and made a minor administrative adjustment in it that turned out to void my grandfathering rights, so in 2010 my policy was discontinued and we were left with ACA coverage from then on. As you say, it was no longer legal for anyone to sell me my old style of coverage. I'd love to know if Barrister's coverage is the kind of thing one still can buy today, and if so, how! The only way I've ever know of getting my hands on something like that was to buy it before the ACA and not void your grandfathering.
#9.1 Texan99 on 2020-05-01 11:09 (Reply)
If you want great, cheap health care just get elected to congress: https://theintercept.com/2020/04/29/coronavirus-congress-health-clinic/
#10 Andrew Stanton on 2020-04-30 09:16 (Reply)

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