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Posted on 01/20/2003 12:43:27 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Laid off from his job at a computer software company in Philadelphia, Andy Szamody wondered where he would find health coverage.
His firm told him it would offer a temporary policy that would cost $212 a month. But "when you're not making any money, that seems like a lot of money," Szamody said.
The local unemployment office informed him of other options, but jobless benefits disqualified Szamody for the cheapest, a basic plan that covered doctor visits but not prescriptions for $30 a month. In the end, he opted simply to do without.
"I find the whole insurance thing totally overwhelming and confusing," Szamody said.
Szamody is one of an estimated 1.4 million Americans who lost insurance coverage over the past year because of layoffs. The total number of uninsured now stands at 41 million, according to the Census Bureau, and the number of young people without coverage is growing especially fast -- those ages 18 to 34 increased by 800,000 in the last year to a total of more than 16 million.
Many, because they are single and without children, take a chance on not getting seriously ill or injured, a decision some experts say isn't totally foolish.
"It's not a bad bet," said Len Nichols, an economist at the Center for Studying Health System Change in Washington, D.C.
"For healthy 20- and 30-year-olds, the immortals, the bet makes sense to them," he said. "But if they do get the worst-case scenario, like cancer, they aren't covered, and taxpayers end up covering their bets."
Ron Pollack, executive director of Families USA, a health care consumer advocacy group, said for most people, there's no choice but to go without insurance.
"Unemployment compensation compared to health care costs is nowhere near enough to pay for coverage," Pollack said.
Szamody admits he worries about getting sick or hurt -- but not enough to forgo a snowboarding trip to Winter Park, Colo. And he doesn't plan to get insurance until he finds a new job that covers him.
"I just see it as a waste of money," he said. "I think, that'll never happen to me, that bad stuff happens to other people. Of course, I never thought I would get laid off either."
Melissa Hunter, 28, was laid off from a New York public relations firm in 2000, and chose to go without health insurance and birth control pills for a year. "It was always on my mind," she said. "I wanted to be responsible and take care of my body."
Hunter eventually got a new job and a new health insurance plan. "The first appointment I made was with my gynecologist for a new birth control prescription," she said.
There aren't enough affordable insurance alternatives for the newly unemployed, according to Diane Rowland, vice president of the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, a nonprofit health care policy group based in Washington, D.C.
Employees, accustomed to sharing the cost with their employer, "are stunned and shocked by the sticker price," said Rowland.
Most laid-off workers are given the single option of remaining on their employer-sponsored health care plan through COBRA, which stands for the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1986. The average cost is $3,000 a year for individuals, and $8,000 a year for a family.
Only one out of five eligible people chooses COBRA, usually because they have a pre-existing condition that requires them to maintain coverage. The rest just don't have insurance, although they do have other options, including private short-term coverage.
Fortis Health Care, the nation's largest short-term health insurance provider, offers insurance in 46 states, including short-term plans for as low as $50 a month in some. The company is targeting the young uninsured.
The Bush administration has proposed tax credits for an estimated 25 million people who cannot get employer-sponsored or public insurance, a move that could especially help young, healthy people for whom premiums are not that high.
"Under the Bush proposal, the tax credit could pick up half or more of your premium," said Kerry Smith, director of government relations at Fortis. "You offer somebody $3,000 a year and they are not going to walk away."
Karen Ignagni, president and chief executive officer of the American Association of Health Plans, agrees. "Research shows that people will buy insurance with help."
But, she said, politicians must also look at current laws and regulations that prevent states from offering affordable products and packages to these individuals. Ignagni said there are about 10 million workers who could get insurance through their employers but still cannot afford to pay their share of the arrangement.
When Bryce Schroer-Shepord, 25, of Rye, N.Y., was laid off from her job at Oxygen Media, she looked into her options. She researched private insurers, and glanced at COBRA coverage, but neither were affordable on her $297 weekly unemployment check.
"I had to prioritize," Shepord said. She didn't want to give up her cell phone or going out with friends to bars. "Finally, it came down to my car payment or health insurance. I chose my car."
It was not an easy decision. Shepord is asthmatic. Her prescription for Singulair, a popular asthma medication, is over $100 a month. Each doctor visit is $90. Most months she paid the cost directly because it was cheaper than a comprehensive health plan. When money was tight she borrowed similar medication from relatives.
Shepord spent almost a year unemployed and uninsured before getting hired as an advertising assistant at ITN Networks. The new job has an insurance plan -- "a good one," she says, but coverage does not start for 90 days. "I have a list of doctors all lined up, and a pile of prescriptions to fill."
Home ownership becoming easier for 20somethings***Real estate industry statistics show the impact. The median age of the first-time homebuyer has been dropping -- from age 32 in 1999 to 31 in 2001, according to a survey done every other year by the National Association of Realtors. And transactions from the under-25 crowd rose from 305,192 in 1999 to 321,136 two years later. Overall, there were 2.85 million first-time buyer transactions in 1999 and 3.09 million in 2001.
Although it's creating headaches for apartment landlords in some cities who rely on 20somethings for rent, experts say financially stable young people who buy property have an unprecedented opportunity to get loans at record-low rates and to begin building equity earlier than some of their parents did. "Homes for these young families are not just a place for them to lay their heads at night. These are little prosperity factories," says Scott Syphax, CEO of the Nehemiah Corporation of California, a nonprofit organization that provides homebuyers with down payment assistance.
The trend is causing some real estate agents to target young buyers. Other agents say savvy 20somethings are coming to them. "They're not going for the flash. They're not going for the fancy cars. They're going for the real estate," says Honore Frumentino, a broker in Deerfield, Ill.*** [Now they need the flexibility to invest their own retirement money.]
Earned income tax credit fails to reach potential, study says*** The earned income tax credit, a key federal assistance program for low-income workers, is failing to achieve its full potential because many eligible people don't claim it and because too much of the benefit is eaten up by fees to tax-return preparation services and high-cost "refund anticipation" loans, a study says.
The study, by Alan Berube of the Brookings Institution's Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy, found that in 27 urban and rural areas around the country, 2 million families got more than $3.4 billion in refunds on the earned income tax credit in 2000, raising the income of working families by an average of $1,700, or 13 percent.*** [Question: Does the whole family work?]
Marriage penalty part myth, fact - When numbers crunched, singles come up shortest "The people who are treated the best are families with stay-at-home spouses, who, not surprisingly, are an important constituency for Republicans," said Edward J. McCaffery, a law professor at the University of Southern California and the author of Taxing Women (University of Chicago Press). As for two-income couples, "the more equal they are as earners, the higher the penalty will be," he added.
One big reason for the larger tax burden may be the role played over the years by Phyllis Schlafly, founder of the Eagle Forum and the indefatigable foe of feminism and of anything in the tax code that encourages women to leave their children for outside work. Schlafly has pushed for child tax credits, which are given for each child in the family and would be increased to $1,000 from $600, and opposed tax breaks for the costs of child care, which are not being expanded. She has fought for years to ensure that marriage-penalty relief flows to families with stay-at-home moms as well as two-income households.*** [Yes! It's hard work to stay home and raise children but the whole country benefits.]
Plan to eliminate estate tax attracts unlikely opposition***Bill Gates Sr., father of America's wealthiest man, launched a lobbying campaign last week, saying elimination of the estate tax would worsen budget deficits, widen the income gap and undermine democracy by letting a small number of families become too wealthy and powerful. "This is a tax which is imposed on very, very few Americans," said Gates, co-chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation set up by his son, a co-founder of Microsoft Corp. The wealthy individuals who pay it worked hard and were perhaps even ingenious, Gates said. But they were able to become millionaires because they were "born in a country that has an Army and a Navy that protects them. They were born in a country which has an orderly market" and "a police force and a court system."
The government must collect taxes, he said, and the estate tax is "absolutely the most progressive element" of the tax code. Gates is working with Responsible Wealth, a Boston-based group that has been circulating a petition among wealthy families to urge Congress not to end the estate tax. Among the billionaires on board are media mogul Ted Turner, investor Warren Buffett, retired banker David Rockefeller Sr. and financier George Soros.*** [Who's stopping them?]
Alternate problem is that anyone who is diagnosed with a problem (especially for followup visits) and becomes "uninsured" will be faced with trying to get insurance with a "pre-existing" condition.
"I had to prioritize," Shepord said. She didn't want to give up her cell phone or going out with friends to bars. "Finally, it came down to my car payment or health insurance. I chose my car."
Now you know whats important
Szamody admits he worries about getting sick or hurt -- but not enough to forgo a snowboarding trip to Winter Park, Colo.
Anyone else find these two sentences kind of ironic?
***Now you know whats important***
Exactly!
Wife, and Leroy, 25 years ago, when I started my Company, I provided 100% coverage for all medical, dental, and eyeware for every family, and it worked!
I've watched the coverage erode, and the premiums increase, and this year, I may have to drop all coverage - We just can't afford it any longer.
There should be a year-long open-season on lawyers..........FRegards
When people claim that they don't have "any" money, they need to look at their expenditures.
That said, compare how much of the income dollar goes out for FICA, taxes, 401k, maybe a car payment, etc before even getting to housing (rent/loan), food, clothing, and savings.
Lowering the government's take of the earned dollar would help people (but it means cutting the size and role of government). No arguments from me there...
Could break a leg in an accident or be bitten by a moose.
No big deal, the rest of us pick up his tab.
It's inevitable as legislation, like a cancer, takes over.
There should be a year-long open-season on lawyers.
Since most legislators are lawyers, that would be very cost-effective.
I don't.
He's assessed cost vs. risk and found the insurance insufficient.
It may be the case that if employers didn't offer health insurance, we might see the uninsured numbers skyrocket.
I would propose that most employees would do better if they banked their insurance premiums (including the employer contribution) and saved it for emergencies.
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