My health insurance premium went up 27% this year. I used to pay $123 a month, starting January I will be paying $169 a month. That $46 a month is coming out of my grocery budget I guess. I've been going to a church every weekend and getting free bread. Most of the food pantries have hours during when I'm working, so that's out. I'm already doing shit like swiping TP and garbage bags from work to so I can purchase less of those things. I'm wearing my clothes indefinitely without washing if they aren't visibly soiled or stinky, and handwashing everything else and hanging it up to dry to save on laundry costs. I Cook everything from scratch at home. I don't own a car, cycle to work daily or take the bus during really bad weather. Outside of a 150 train ride to visit family, I get to take an actual vacation once per decade. I'm sleeping on the floor because my mattress is almost 20 years old and so uncomfortable. Once ever 7 - 10 years I upgrade my PC. I don't have cable or streaming services.
I'm lucky and I know it. I'm so scared for families with children, and people that don't have regular hours at their jobs or decent coverage through their work, and can't afford to self pay premiums via commercial plans. Families that were paying $700-800 a month for insurance are going to see those premiums go up even more. I can't imagine trying to feed an entire family on the pay we get. I'm paying $1300 for a one bedroom, I can't imagine having to rent a 2 or 3 bedroom. I feel like I'm barely hanging on, and I don't have the resources to help anyone else. Where I work there are tons of panhandlers are walking around hitting people up for food or money. 10 years ago, there were 0 panhandlers. The panhandlers are getting aggressive too. I had one put his hands on me when I told him up front I was having a bad day, I didn't want to talk to another human being at all, and I didn't have any $ to give, so save the story.
Stop the world, I want to get off this ride.
Sorry to hear that. I feel like i am in the same boat for insurance. On Jan 1st Im getting worse insurance than the previous 8 years and my total per month will now be $766 which is $193 more a month than it has been. I am already scrambling to make ends meet, this may very well be the final nail that puts me over... the biggest kicker to me has always been having to still pay for every doctor visit, every abnormal thing that needs to be checked out, and paying for medication. Those will all be higher for me next year as well so what am I even getting out of this? All in all ite over 10k a year between insurance and visits and seriously what am I even getting outside a quick draw of blood and how are you doing a few times a year... it's out of control.
I spent 10 years working for vision and dental insurance. The only benefit of plans with a high deductible, like what you are describing, is it puts a cap on your own spending. Look at your plan's maximum out of pocket. That number represents how much you have to spend out of pocket, before you are fully covered. What you spend towards the deductible is counted towards the maximum out of pocket. (If my deductible is $4000, and my max oop is $10,000, I won't get 100% coverage until I have spent $4000 towards the deductible, and $6000 in copays/coinsurance.)
In all honesty, some of these plans have such high deductibles and max out of pockets that even with insurance, a major illness would be financially devastating. I've been in that position and just decided not to have insurance. Like if I'm going to be fucked no matter what, may as well save those insurance premiums for an emergency instead of paying a middleman for nothing.