Wow...that isn't even catastrophic care. Remember when they said that our high deductible plans weren't good enough? It was better than what you're facing.
We had more medical expenses than normal this year...a broken arm, lacrosse stick to the throat requiring ER and an MRI, some PT...still didn't sniff meeting the deductible. All out of pocket.
Now the rub is that we pay the rates negotiated by the insurance companies...without insurance we'd have to pay close to double for all that stuff as well as full price for all of our preventative care. But it still wouldn't have exceeded the premium and deductible. And that's with paying 45% less that we will likely pay this year.
The biggest problem with this system is how is stifles competition, both among insurance companies and providers. All plans have to cover the exact same things, and have to cover a bunch of stuff many people don't want or need. The only variables are whether you want to get screwed more up front or screwed more if you actually get sick. If insurance companies were allowed to offer an actual variety of plans, and compete with each other across geographic areas, and if consumer price choice entered into the equation in any way shape or form, we would see far more people signing up and costs would plummet. My family for example would be buying only catastrophic coverage and paying for our preventative care out of pocket...which would cause us to compare provider prices and help to bring costs down. There is no reason to do that now, in fact we can't even get a provider price quote ahead of time. It's just "take your services and we'll tell you what you owe later". What other kind of business could sustain itself like that without mandating people to buy it? No wonder costs keep rising.
As it is, we are some of the few who can actually afford to pay for this (albeit by greatly reducing or eliminating our college and retirement savings), and we are forced to question whether it isn't financially more feasible for us to just roll the dice and take the penalty. If we had a slightly lower income buying this wouldn't be an option. The subsidy limit is 90,000...after taxes you bring home maybe 50 or 60,000 and you're supposed to be able to afford 41,000 in out of pocket costs? So what will that do? Cause more people to drop out and drive premiums up even higher.
As ark says, working as intended. Ultimately it will be the government who drives prices down, by rationing care. Instead of allowing us to decide what we value and what we don't and how much we're willing to pay for it.
Sorry for the long rant, it's incredibly frustrating to me, and why Republicans can't explain this situation to people and how to fix it in simple terms, and what we risk if we go the socialized medicine route, I will never understand.
