Health Insurance Blog

According to the article “Fixing Health Care Is Good for Business” by Gary Locke on the Wall Street Journal’s website, without health insurance reform the price of an average household’s health insurance will almost double over the next 10 years from $13,000 to $25,000. 

This is why health care reform is so crucial.  47 million Americans are currently without health insurance and the rising health insurance costs are severely affecting American companies as well.  In 1960, companies spent about 1.2% of payroll on health insurance and by 2006 it was up to 9.9%.  This rate is unsustainable for companies and has to change because it is crushing US jobs. 

The Rand Corporation released a study which showed that excess health insurance costs were contributing to significant job losses.  Escalating costs are also causing flat wages and higher prices on products and services because money is going towards health care costs which have doubled over the last 9 years.  Health insurance reform appears to be around the corner so let’s hope some of these staggering statistics can be turned around.

Young healthy adults are attractive targets for health insurance companies.  Consequently some insurers tailor affordable health insurance plans at this segment of the population with individual health plans between $40 and $70 per month.

Two health insurers who offer such products are Aetna (Bodyguard) and Wellpoint (Tonik).  Keep in mind in order to keep monthly premiums low, the insurers have shifted a greater portion of the health care costs to the member, and thus higher out of pocket expenses should be expected.

In a nutshell, the trade-off is lower monthly premiums in exchange for paying a larger amount out of pocket.

These low-cost health plans might be right for you if you are healthy, don’t currently require any perscription drugs and don’t participate in excessively risky activities where severe accidents would be likely.

Several individual health plans from AvMed have been introduced in Florida’s Miami-Dade and Broward counties, states a press release. They suggest these plans would be most appropriate for these groups:

• self-employed individuals
• students
• early retirees
• people laid off/between jobs

The AvMed Individual Health policies’ benefits include some preventative care without a deductible, a maximum lifetime benefit of $5 million and full integration with Health Savings Accounts. An innovative three-month deductible carry-over lessens the burden of Florida health insurance costs by applying payments made in the last three months of one year to the following year’s deductible.

A variety of AvMed health insurance options with different levels of coverage are available to individuals and families; there are also plans specifically reserved for children (ages 2 through 17). If these new offerings are successful, the release claims that they will be expanded statewide.

Find more information about Miami health insurance.