Who has health insurance?

I am curious how many people have no health insurance, or if you do have it, how good is it?

I work for a non-profit HMO, which is supposed to mean health maintenance organization, not profit making machine. We're not perfect. No one is. But we're very, very good. I'm proud of my company.

My health insurance is okay enough for my needs. My employer doesn't offer dental. Even if it did, I figure dental is a rip off anyway. The really expensive stuff you need the insurance for only pays about 50%. When you factor in premiums and deductables and the crappy coverage, it is almost better not to have it at all and suffer with bad teeth. Who can afford to get their teeth fixed anymore?

Mine includes Dental, but that just means you can get your teeth cleaned.

After housing, food, etc... there's no money for anything else, and barely enough to cover utilities and unexpected expenses.

I honestly don't know why they even call it insurance. On a good plan it is barely a discount plan. AND dental procedures are SOOOO expensive to begin with. A root canal runs around $800. If you didn't have $800 to pay for it, why do they think you'd have $400? Sure it is half, but half of too much is still a lot.

Mine costs me $250 / month out of pocket, plus co-pays...

My previous employer had $35/month, $10 prescrip and $5 co-pay, and very low co-pays for surgery etc. The only thing that bothered me was it hardly covered classes, maybe $150 out of $500 for glasses plus office visit etc..

plus co-pays,80/20,and $500 deductible per insured. $150/mo for my husband and $275 for me on the "family plan." Would pay the same amount per/mo for all family members whether one or ten. We paid $256/per month for basically the same plan as late as last month. He switched employers, different provider.

$637/month with a $5000 deductible! Granted, I'm no spring chicken, but COME ON! I'm in perfect health and have never made a claim! Single payer NOW!!!

At about 97$ a month. For my income, that is high for having no dental. and a high deductible When I register for school, I will probably take the university's offered coverage.

get laid off?? What a joke...

huh?

It's thin sections. Minerals.

I'm a student (nursing student, to be exact---how ironic/sad is that?).

Husband's job offers coverage for him, but it would be about $300 a month for me to be added to the policy.

Find that stupid, since every other company I worked for (I worked at the same company he does) gave free, or very very low cost coverage for spouses, and in some cases children, although most you had to pay (again, rather minimially) for coverage for children.

But not at this gem of a job. Nope. No spousal coverage at all.

The good thing (??) is that I have had health insurance for MAYBE 4 years of my 27 years on this planet---mom never had health coverage when I was young, and didn't get coverage until I got my first 'real' job when I turned 22 or so.

SO I'm used to living life very, very carefully....:sad:

Company pays for it all.

Bad is all I can afford and it still costs me about $400 a month. Last year my son dislocated his shoulder at school and thankfully the school's insurance covered our deductibles and copays. For 2 hours in the emergency room and 4 xrays we were billed more than $2500.

If it happens again on my dime, I'll consider reducing it myself.

Still hoping I won't get sick

A major defense contractor. Cigna for medical, Delta Dental, and VSP for vision.

No complaints.

Canada's health system covers the minimum. You still have to get your own coverage for prescription drugs, dental, eye etc

...and credit given to my employer as well.

It used to be unbelievably good, but it must have gotten to be too expensive, so the HR dept. switched to an underwhelming group. At least it's PPO, rather than HMO.

I chip in $25/month, pretax. It's good coverage other than the issue with the payer's perception of what's the right amount to pay compared to what stuff actually costs where I live.

With the skyrocketing costs of health insurance, most companies are shifting more of the burden onto employees.

So those of us with coverage, cheap or expensive, will probably be paying more with each passing year.

My employer used to have a rotten plan(friend of the owner offered), but in the past couple of years we changed thank goodness.

And as a single the co-payments out of my paycheck are not too bad at this point (course they ate up the Bush tax cut I got). But I do feel bad for many of our workers with families who can't afford the co-pays.

Also have a dental plan I pay for that is good and affordable. And I at least can afford supplemental AFLAC coverage of disability, cancer, heart and a medical savings account (just think the use it in a fiscal year or lose money contributed is stupid).

to lower my monthly costs...no doctors visits covered, no dental, no meds covered...just basic "if I fall off the roof and break my back " insurance...and I can barely afford that.

Don't have a job (working as a temp right now) with any benefits, yet. Too old to be covered by parents (and my mother had great benefits from her county govt. job, too).

What if something happens (I'm seriously injured, economy takes a drastic downturn, etc.) and I'm unable to eventually find a job with benefits? I'd be completely screwed, wouldn't I?

I'm currently unemployed so i pay three hundred dollars a month for the COBRA plan to keep my insurance current. I've got a prescription right now that would run $1200 a month if I was uninsured, so it's one of those things I have to do. For now anyway.

I don't have prescription drug coverage because it costs more for the coverage than I pay for prescription drugs for my entire family.

so the group insurance is very good. I have health insurance, eye care, dental and life insurance. And I only pay $48 a month. But I am close to retirement age and will have to continue to work for a while so that I can continue to receive these benefits. I have a fantastic and fun job, so I really don't want to leave it. The pay is lousy, but the benefits are great. All kinds of holidays, lots of vacation time, sick leave and bonus days off.

Having recently moved, I have to establish new doctors ... so, I went to an internist to carry on what the doctor in my previous location had been caring for ... so, I have, at least, one outstanding bill for $153 (sort of a physical to become familiar with me, etc.) ... so far, Medicare hasn't paid anything against it ... saying, we don't usually pay for routine office visits ... say, what? Routine office visits? at my age, and on disability ... there's no such thing ... still wait-n-see situation ... hopefully, the MD's billing folks will know what to do .... never had a problem in my previous location ...

dental and vision - forget about it

healthcare hasn't always been a joke in this country ... but, it certainly is now ...... that corporate America private touch ...

Employer paid for the employee, 50% paid for dependents. Our benefits have steadily declined with the state's budgetary problems. Apparently us state employees cost too damn much, so one way to cut costs is out of benefits.

Until I get a job at least.

Unless you are already sick, if you take the same money you are paying in premiums and start putting it into a special bank account set aside for health care, you'll be a lot better off. Without insurance, most clinics, doctors, etc. will give you an awesome discount. And they are much less likely to prescribe unnecessary treatments, medications, etc.

If you are seriously injured, the hospitals are required to treat you even if you're broke.

OK, if I had kids, I might feel differently about it.

People with one kind of insurance go to one set of clinics and hospitals and people with the other kind go to the other set. Everyone else gets charged a ridiculously high fee. My coworker's boyfriend had to pay $110 to see a family physician at our insurance's clinic. We pay $150/month through our employer. My doctor is big on prescribing drugs but I usually have to go three or four times for the same problem before they'll do any tests, paying my $20 copay each time. If office visits were $28 like they were in my home town, I would do without insurance. Where I live, people without insurance get overcharged though.

I really need to get a different job, but I am hesitant because I'd lose my insurance. Most employers around here require that you work for a certain amount of time before you are insured. There are temp jobs that I'd like to try, but if you stay a temp, no or very bad insurance.

going, but I'm paying over $300/month. I found another job, but it's just part time so there is no health coverage. I'm looking for a second PT job so I can make ends meet; if I could find one with health coverage, that would be great. If not, I can keep doing cobra for a year and a half. I'm hoping that by then there will be a Democrat in the White House and the economy will have improved so I can find a decent full time job, which I can't do now because there's way too much competition for every job, and I don't have the super-duper qualifications that many others have.

and I'm paying over a thou a month for family medical and dental coverage. Sickening-- no pun intended.