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Insurance is a terrible name for what we have, its not insurance, its blackmail. You dying and zero being paid out by the insurance company is the best profit
by bfrog 2y ago
Insurance is a terrible name for what we have, its not insurance, its blackmail.
You dying and zero being paid out by the insurance company is the best profit margin they can ask for, that's the entire goal of an insurance company at this point.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoIf there are no payouts, then they have to return all premiums. They only get paid a percentage of covered care. This presents it's own set of tradeoffs, namely between decreasing premiums to attract subscribers, and what is covered, to keep subscribers happy.
- bfrog 2y agoThey don’t return anything, what are you talking about? Subscribers are never happy, it’s very expensive and fails to cover many things. But what choice is there? Don’t get coverage and hope you don’t get sick? Often times you don’t even get a choice… the company decides what plan and such you can get. So no, there’s no incentive to do the right thing other than the potential loss of corporate customers (which don’t have the same incentive as individuals) or potential lawsuits.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoIm talking about that ACA 85/15% rule. Health insurers must spend 85% of premiums on payouts or return funds to the insured.
- brokenmachine 2y agoNot American but it seems so crazy to me that you can't even realistically choose your provider, since it's combined with your job. Seems insane.
- bdangubic 2y agoof course you can but it ain’t cheap. $20k for a family of 3 is what I pay
- brokenmachine 2y agoThat is a lot. Does your job pay you the amount they would have paid for you?
- s1artibartfast 2y agoNope. It might even be illegal to offer a cash alternative. There are lots of complex laws around what companies can do, must do, and can't do with respect to healthcare.
- bdangubic 2y agoyou can negotiate your way to anything you want. while companies technically might have laws to comply, it is on the employee to negotiate their way into whatever it is that they desire. for instance, I may be negotiating my salary and get to mutually-agreeable amount X. I can then say I do not want to be covered by your health insurance but in lieu of that I need my salary to be X+$30,000 to cover the cost of the health insurance I will purchase myself for my family. the company of course can say yay or nay on that but this is the avenue one can explore to get around this company-provided-HI nonsense.
- bdangubic 2y agounfortunately - no (as you may have guessed it)
- brokenmachine 2y agoI hadn't guessed. Good for your employers I guess. Or are you somehow double-covered?
- bdangubic 2y ago
- s1artibartfast 2y agoMany employer offer some choices. Mine offers two providers and two plans for each. One is for profit (UHC) and the other is non-profit (Kaiser). The consensus is that Kaiser rations healthcare and makes referrals difficult, but procedures are always covered. UHC let's people direct their own care, but reimbursement is less certain.
- nradov 2y agoUsually you can choose your provider. Employers typically offer health plans from only one or two payers, but each payer's health plans have many network providers. Of course some of those providers may be inconveniently located or not accepting new patients so depending on where you live the actual choices may be very limited. The other option is to go to an out-of-network provider but that typically means higher out-of-pocket charges for the patient.