Unaffordable Premiums, I’m Scared


I lost my job and my medical insurance one year before I was eligible for retirement benefits. My husband has a monthly retirement benefit but no medical. We are both 59 years old and in great health but based on our age our medical insurance premiums are at the highest. Our total income is 4000.00 a month after taxes and our insurance premium is 1050.00 a month for a high deductible policy. We are paying 1/4 of our income monthly to cover catastrophic insurance! We are rapidly running through our savings to pay the premiums, we can’t afford to go to the doctors anymore. I was so hopeful that Obamacare would be fair but it is extended welfare that has hurt my family

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Bcbs tx dropped all individual ppo plans now everyone on those plans has to either go with Bcbstx HMO or find new carrier. In Texas bcbs paid out 400-500 million more in claims than collected in premium so I read on a news site – of course bcbs is not being up front on the matter. The employer based plans in Texas are still intake but my question is what are they going to do when they come up in the red again – maybe it was the employer based policies that drove up those claims cost. Who regulates these insurance companies? Is there any over site?? Obamacare is neither affordable or quality care for anyone whether your getting a subsidy or not. Do you think a person who is getting a subsidy to help pay for their ins actually has the money to pay co payments, co insurance and the deductible.
It’s ironic that we live in a country with once great healthcare and Drs who cared. They too can’t operate under this much red tape – no one even understands their own healthcare and worse yet the carriers don’t even understand what you have and can’t even pay claims properly.
Shame on our goverment for imposing this on us and this will prove to be one of the worst laws and obama shame on you – I wish you had to take out a plan – pay premiums as if you did have a terminal existing illness although as in my case, never have a claim – I pay 679 a month for a 6k ded – HMO – figure out who the best Drs are under your plan – hope they are accepting patients – make sure you stay in network – God forbid you need specialized care and have either no doctors I. Your area or no doctors that accept your plan – etc etc.
by forcing the insurerd off their plans to insure the Un-insured, now basically we are all un-insured – we can’t afford our plans or the deductibles!!!!!!!

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Your frustration is noted. The PPACA contains lots of cost cutting measures and new rules for healthcare providers and insurers to ensure quality and affordability. But we know this hasn’t worked wonders everywhere. BCBS in Texas pops up a lot by name. Not sure what happened there. Of course this is a private health insurance company we are talking about, can’t judge the whole law by the experince of one provider, although it can give us insight. Same for one doctor or one hospital. We know of insurers, hospitals, and doctors who are thriving under the ACA and are embracing the new rules and coming out ahead. But that is on the private for profit side of things. The other side is you and I.

For regular people a high priced bronze HMO with large out-of-pocket costs is a little hard to bare and it’s a lot to ask of people. I think in that regard a single payer catastrophic coverage like original Medicare would have made a lot more sense. But this is sense for you and I, not necessarily the industry.

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We are in the exact same boat with the same income. I’m disabled and my wife works a part time job but in the mean time we are shocked we have to pay 25 percent of our income to Obamacare affordable healthcare.

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Even if you receive a subsidy, you still have a hefty deductible. Hopefully, you won’t have to be admitted to the hospital. An HSA account is for a high deductible health plan, so it doesn’t help everyone. For people on fixed incomes under 65 years old, this mandatory law can potentially create a lot of debt.

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Experienced the same issue with unaffordable premiums. I am 59 wife 61. After 12 years bcbstx we were cancelled. After exploring our options we realized our ppo ins policy could not be replaced for less than 1300.00 dollars, we were paying 683.00.we had to refinance our home out to 20yrs from 8 yes left in order to budget increase. Totally threw our budget out of balance. Thank you OBAMA.

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Sorry to hear that. Again, did you check to see if you were eligible for cost assistance? The cap for subsidies is $62,920 and is based on Modified AGI, not just gross income.

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At $48,000 a year Gross Income you should be able to find a Marketplace plan that caps your plan at a lower premium. We should expect that your coverage is on the higher end of things due to age, but 1/4th of your income is too high. The cut-off for subsidies for a two person household is $62,920. When you adjust your gross income it should be even lower. With an HSA and other deductions you could maybe even bring your Modified Adjusted Income down past the $39,325 mark that qualifies you for out-of-pocket savings on Marketplace plans too. Make sure you are using HealthCare.Gov to get covered.

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