There was a presentation on my company's 2022 health care plan today. And I'm not sure if I should sign up for the company plan in next week's open enrollment, or whether I should continue paying my own way for health care. Going with the company plan may save me $450/month in insurance payments, but might cost me in two ways: (1) Locking me into a job I don't like until Medicare kicks in, and (2) Costing me more in drug prices and medical co-payments. I won't go into details here, but I am leaning towards going with the company plan. Unfortunately, I don't have much time to make a decision.
My firm was gobbled up by a larger firm at the beginning of the year. The smaller firm did not offer a health care plan I considered worth the money - I decided to continue purchasing my health insurance on the Obamacare exchange in New York. The larger firm had more negotiating power, and got a better deal for its employees. So this got me thinking about a simple question:
Why should the quality and amount of healthcare provided to a person be dependent on the employer that s/he works for?
This is something that bothers me, as the system we have here in the USA seems to be designed to have sub-optimal outcomes. So several more questions come to mind:
Why should an employer be involved in negotiating health insurance coverage?
Why can't an employer subsidize an employee's health care in a way similar to non-taxed reimbursements for employee education at a local college?
Why shouldn't the final consumer of the health insurance product (the employee) be the one exposed to deciding which company's insurance product to buy, when "Apples to Apples" comparisons can be made on the Obamacare exchanges?
Why can't ALL Obamacare exchange products provide nationwide coverage?
The answer to most of these questions are either political or historical. We would be better served if corporations would get out of the business of buying healthcare for their employees, and if government would ensure that healthcare firms only sold policies that met minimum requirements. We were on the way to doing this until Trump screwed things up by allowing "short term" plans to be sold instead of Obamacare exchange policies. This allowed insurers to provide insurance that wasn't worth much, but gave buyers the illusion of getting value. Yet, Obamacare has provided a path to a long term solution.
Since it's late at night and I can't do this topic justice, I will elaborate on it in more detail at a later date.
