I Hate Health Insurance

The whole idea of health insurance is wrong. Insurance protects from rare things. Health care is not rare. (Now, accidents and catastrophic health problems are rare, and insurance can be a good thing there.) As a society we have been trained to use health insurance. If you don't believe me go ask your doctor how much he charges for a sports physical. He doesn't know. He doesn't do the billing, and chances are it's different depending on your insurance. What's even more telling is that most people wouldn't even think to ask their doctor how much a procedure costs. They blindly pay the co-pay and their premiums and just live with it.

The annual premium that a health insurer charges for a health plan covering a family of four averaged $12,100 in 2007, and that's for big companies (source). Most plans have a $500-1000 deductible. Prices have gone up nearly 10% a year recently, so that puts you at paying a minimum of $14,000 per year before your insurance company will actually pay for anything. Is there anything else in your life that you pay that much per year for, oh yeah, maybe your house!

That's not the end of it. After ripping you off the insurance company then sticks it to us doctors. They set the amount that we can charge, and then after telling us what to charge they tell us what they will pay. (It's not what we charge). Then they send the bill to us saying we'll only pay this much and you already have a co-pay, so if you want the rest then you have to be the bad guy and go after the patient.

Here's the situation that I ran into today. A patient was treated. I am a provider on her insurance plan. We billed the insurance company. They said that I was not covered because her plan is just the basic plan and not the standard plan, so her plan only covers preferred providers not participating providers. So they will not pay anything. I am stuck with the horrible task of either taking no money for my services or charging this patient the ridiculous amount that the insurance company requires us to charge, but never pays. I can no longer legally charge her our cash rate because it is not the same day of service (a wonderful law passed thanks to insurance companies). Boy it's a good thing she's paying her $14000 to the insurance company to take care of her this year.

For $14000 she could probably see me for the rest of her life. Everyone think about it. What could you do with that extra $14000 you could save by not having health insurance. Now think about this what would happen if you took that $14000 and put it into a high yield savings account for 5 years. That's right you'd have $70,000 saved up plus interest. You could probably then leave that in an account gaining interest every year and only pull money out to pay cash for your physicals, dental visits, and even having a baby. You'd shop around for the best health care deals. You could find doctors who were willing to give you a discount for paying at the time of service so they didn't have to deal with insurance companies. You could still get catastrophic insurance with a $30,000 deductible which you can cover with your Health Savings Account. That's right, that's what they're called, and you can contribute to them before taxes. Make sure you find the right one that doesn't just make the money go away at the end of the year, but rolls over. Here is the link to the governments FAQs on HSAs.

If you followed this plan at the end of 5 years you'd probably end up with an extra $5,000 - 10,000 each year. Now what could you do with an extra $10,000. That's quite the raise to look forward to.