I've never been a fan of Michael Moore despite the fact he grew up in Flint and went to Michigan State. Probably becuase he is a raging democrat.
But I watched Sicko this week, and loved it. Moore does a great job showing how bad the health insurance situation is in the US. This hits home for me, since I pay $1452/mo. He details how health insurance companies deny care which costs people their lives. My problems are far less, but also different. I have a big problem with paying 1452/mo and not receiving much care in return. When adding up my families' actual health care costs, they are around $5,000 per year. So 13,000 of my 18,000 per year is subsidizing the people who are really sick and require expensive treatments and surgeries, etc. I understand this is how insurance works, but I feel like I should be given an option to be in a plan that has a higher deductible, say 5k. I have no problem paying for my own routine care.
I feel like going for your annual physical is similar to getting your oil changed on your car, but when you go to the oil change store, you don't give them your insurance card and pay a co-pay. Routine maintenance should be on you. The big ticket items, like surgeries and MRI's, etc, now this is where you need some insurance. So let me pay my own 5k, then I will be happy to pay 500/mo or so to get the catastrophic coverage. That would be a total cost of 11,000 per year, far less than the 18,000 I am paying now.
From the insurance company standpoint, they are off the hook for the first 5k and then they collect 6k for the catastrphic, and they are likely to profit substantially from me. As it is today, they are raping me.
Of course, what I described above is an HSA Plan, which I would love to be in. However, my COMPANY doesn't offer an HSA Plan, so I can't have one. Let me get this straight: I pay the bill, but I can't choose my plan. Then, because I am a small company, our "small" group plan is more expensive than the same plan offered by a "large" company. Totally screwed up.
Back to Sicko, Moore catches the insurance company with their pants down. Then he compares the US system to Socialized Medicine of France, UK, and Cuba, all which have "better" health systems than the US and nobody has to pay. He does a poor job comparing taxes here vs. there, which I'm sure is different, but I don't know.
Finally, he made me actually WANT socialized medicine here, but then I remembered that our government blows at administering just about everything, so the last thing I want is my tax rate to jump from 30% to 40% just so I don't have to pay the extra health insurance premium.....
I could go on and on............
