“It’s as much as buying a basic economy car,” said Drew Altman, chief executive officer of the Kaiser Family Foundation, “but buying it every year.” The nonprofit health research group conducts the yearly survey of coverage that people get through work, the main source of insurance in the U.S. for people under age 65.

While employers pay most of the costs of coverage, according to the survey, workers’ average contribution is now $6,000 for a family plan. That’s just their share of upfront premiums, and doesn’t include co-payments, deductibles and other forms of cost-sharing once they need care.

The seemingly inexorable rise of costs has led to deep frustration with U.S. health care, prompting questions about whether a system where coverage is tied to a job can survive. As premiums and deductibles have increased in the last two decades, the percentage of workers covered has slipped as employers dropped coverage and some workers chose not to enroll. Fewer Americans under 65 had employer coverage in 2017 than in 1999, according to a separate Kaiser Family Foundation analysis of federal data. That’s despite the fact that the U.S. economy employed 17 million more people in 2017 than in 1999.

“What we’ve been seeing is a slow, slow kind of drip-drip erosion in employer coverage,” Altman said.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/annual-health-insurance-costs-hit-record-high-above-dollar20000/ar-AAHPRKp

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888198)

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2018/02/26/how-american-citizens-finance-health-care-for-undocumented

Current federal policy is to prohibit federal tax funding of health care to unauthorized immigrants through either Medicaid or Obamacare. Nevertheless, rough estimates suggest that the nation's 3.9 million uninsured immigrants who are unauthorized likely receive about $4.6 billion in health services paid for by federal taxes, $2.8 billion in health services financed by state and local taxpayers, another $3.0 bankrolled through "cost-shifting" i.e., higher payments by insured patients to cover hospital uncompensated care losses, and roughly $1.5 billion in physician charity care. In addition to these amounts, unauthorized immigrants likely benefit from at least $0.9 billion in implicit federal subsidies due to the tax exemption for nonprofit hospitals and another $5.7 billion in tax expenditures from the employer tax exclusion.

All told, Americans cross-subsidize health care for unauthorized immigrants to the tune of $18.5 billion a year. Of this total, federal taxpayers provided $11.2 billion in subsidized care to unauthorized immigrants in 2016.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38892715)

This year, total out of pocket healthcare expenditures for my family was probably $8,800.00. But we didn’t hit our deductible on any one family member, didn’t hit the family out-of-pocket maximum by a long shot.

Even with all of this spending, healthcare is too expensive to actually consume. I haven’t been to a doctor or even had my blood drawn to check for things like cholesterol or blood pressure in over a decade. I haven’t been to a dentist in nearly 20 years. The only doctor I would go to occasionally was a psychiatrist, but they don’t take insurance and I can’t afford it anymore (also, nothing actually makes life better anyways so who cares, just suck it up).

So yeah. My kids go and get their shots and periodically get medication for ear infections. My wife goes to see a gynecologist. We do not consume much healthcare at all and each doctor’s appointment literally costs thousands of dollars.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888233)

This represented the best value for my family when we were looking for 2019 plans. This is an off-exchange plan that is _cheaper_ than the options in the California exchange (other than Kaiser). This is a high-deductible plan and is "silver," which is the second-lowest of the four levels of plans. Will reassess for 2020, but would like to keep kids with pediatrician and wife would like her allergist to be in-network. Otherwise no one is going to the doctor - I haven't been in at least 15 years and my family has no health issues or medications other than wife's allergist and birth control.

At least I get to invest $7k in HSA plan.

If non-1099 people and non-entrepreneurs actually saw what health insurance costs this would be front page news daily. It's outrageous.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888288)

I got nauseous reading that not flame

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888290)

“That’ll be $355,000”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888561)

Even with insurance, I argue with the billing dept sometimes. I went to a dermatologist and got a mole removed and they charged my insurance like $3000. Because I owe coinsurance being on a PPO, I was supposed to pay $300. I told them there’s no way I’m paying $300 for a stupid mole removal and we negotiated it down to $100.

If I were Jim Kelly, I’d just let the birth hospital bill go to collections and then settle for less money in collections before it affects your credit.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38889468)

Mentioned above and I think before to you, but bill for first was ~$125k all-in. Not sure what % Stanford-Packard would have settled for, but still material cash outlay.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38889790)

Powergoy move. I am fine getting on the phone and haggling loudly in Laotian. There is a ton of shit you could’ve questioned on your birth bill, but yes, requires getting in the weeds and doing some digging on the diagnostic codes and market rates for procedures. I do know if you start throwing around words like fraudulent billing practices (which they all engage in), they magically start reducing bills.

But in the meantime, can’t you get a barebones catastrophic plan to cover something like a big accident or cancer?

Bigger picture is that your employer is illegally using you as 1099 employee and you need to sue them and GTFO to somewhere where you’re salaried, but that’s a whole other story.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38889940)

Yes.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38890146)

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888315)

https://www.uhone.com/

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888717)

First birth was billed at $100k (emergency c section, complications) and I paid $5k (max OOP). Second birth normal billed at $50k (i paid $2000).

I realize this is completely atypical and crazy.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38888877)

As the middle class die, we either get the billionaires to pay for it or we the middle class / upper middle class fund the medical care for the other 90% of the country.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#38891800)

WSJ: A family’s health insurance costs nearly $24,000 this year after the biggest increase in more than a decade

https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/health-inflations-big-hike-this-year-in-charts-2d278f69

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#46954097)

https://www.xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=5440582&mc=48&forum_id=2

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#47028100)

the price of owning your own business and not being a wagecuck. LOL at America 'encouraging' entrepreneurship

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#47714686)

https://thehill.com/policy/5567473

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4351386&forum_id=2...id#49367032)