Affordable Health Insurance Available
Guest Blogger Wes Shannon has worked in the insurance and financial services industry for over 25 years in Fort Worth, Texas. A Fort Worth native, Wes is a proud Texan and promotes Texas’s cultural values. Please feel free to contact Wes for a comprehensive financial and insurance review.
Previously I explained that health care is available to everyone – there is no health care crisis in this country. Now let’s show why there is no health insurance crisis either, which I can most effectively do by showing that health insurance is affordable to everyone.
In terms of a health insurance crisis, can we agree that folks who currently have coverage aren’t in a crisis? They may think their premium is too high, but it isn’t a crisis, OK? So, let’s look at the uninsured as the crisis.
In 2008 The Los Angeles Times reported the number of people without insurance declined from 47 million in 2006 to 45.7 million in 2007 which they counted as 15.3% of Americans. We will get into just who those folks are, but let’s keep this in perspective. When insurance is mandatory, there are folks who don’t buy it. States mandate automobile liability insurance, but some people drive without it. Texas did a study this summer in Travis County and found the proportion of uninsured motorists on the road was over 25%. Sounds to me like we have an automobile liability insurance crisis – where are the cries about that?
Recently, Brian Sullivan of Fox News reported that 17.6 million of the uninsured live in households with annual incomes of over $50,000 (9 million have household incomes over $75,000). These people can afford health insurance but choose not to buy! That is their choice. Last I checked, we live in a free society which allows individuals the freedom to make choices even if we think it is a poor choice. Any health insurance agent can tell of people who choose not to buy health insurance that was affordable.
Twice in the past 12 months I have had owners of successful small businesses with many young employees, men and women in their 20’s, try to offer health insurance to the employees and could not get enough of them to sign up. In both cases the employer would have paid half of the insurance premium, leaving the employees to pay about $110 per month for coverage — and they refused. These businesses pay wages much above the minimum, but the employees prefer a cash bonus instead of health insurance. 20-something-year-olds think they are bullet proof and will never get sick or hurt. These individuals choose to be uninsured. Perhaps you believe we should legislate away people’s right to make decisions you disagree with. Ain’t arrogance great? OK, back to the numbers.
Half of the remaining 28.1 million uninsured Americans are eligible for Medicaid and SCHIP but have chosen not to participate. However, even they would be signed up immediately if they were to go to a hospital. Your typical insurance company doesn’t want to buy a claim that way – where premiums only are collected when coverage is needed, but the government programs allow it – last minute coverage for those eligible for the programs. The question really should be why does anybody pay for those plans except when they need the coverage?
This leaves that last 14.1 million uninsured and not eligible for a government program. About 6.1 million of them are not US citizens but illegal aliens. Although we take care of them while they are here, do you really expect they are going to apply for insurance when they won’t apply for a green card?
This leaves about 8 million Americans uninsured, not eligible for a government program, with households earning less than $50,000. Those were the numbers in 2008, and it was about 2.6% of our total population. That is less than half the number of individuals between jobs during an economic boom. Many of those are only temporarily without coverage. This is a crisis? Do you seriously believe we need to overhaul and nationalize our health care system as the only way to deal with 3% of our population being uninsured? I thought we just bumped the eligibility threshold for government plans to about that level. That should take care of these folks. Adjusting eligibility threshold seems less like a heavy-handed government led by people with a hidden agenda and more like an attempt to provide a solution to this specific group without coverage. Where are the throngs of uninsured clamoring for coverage? Am I missing something?
You may ask about folks who get turned down for coverage, or who have pre-existing conditions. The states have dealt with this. In Texas, if a person has a preexisting condition there is the Texas Health Insurance Risk Pool which will provide a reasonable cost health insurance plan to anyone who has been turned down by two or more insurance companies. Just spend a little time to discuss your family’s health insurance with an agent to find out what is the best plan for you.
So, there is really not a crisis of coverage and health insurance can be affordable for everyone.
Next time – the role of insurance in making health care so expensive.
Wes Shannon has worked in the insurance and financial services industry for over 25 years in Fort Worth, Texas. A Fort Worth native, Wes is a proud Texan and promotes Texas’s cultural values. Please feel free to contact Wes for a comprehensive financial and insurance review.
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